Donald Noah was a veterinary member of the Investigative Committee. He was appointed during the October 15, 2014 Board Meeting and subsequently reappointed at the August 17, 2016 and October 17, 2018 meetings. LinkedIn and other online sources indicate that he obtained his veterinary degree from Ohio State and went on to serve in the US Air Force in biosecurity roles. He went to work at Midwestern University's new veterinary school starting in 2014, eventually becoming the head of their Public Health and Epidemiology program. A committed champion of the One Health concept, he later left Midwestern to become the Assistant Dean for One Health at Lincoln Memorial University, another outside-the-box veterinary school launched around the same era as Midwestern's. Some online sources also cite Noah as being the head of Midwestern's Equine and Bovine Center, while others state he was the Director of the One Health Center at Midwestern.
Noah's bio with the Airstream Club (link) is a bit more informative with respect to his military service. According to that bio, his Air Force experience also included senior leadership positions with the Department of Homeland Security as Deputy Assistant Secretary for National Biodefense, with the Department of Defense as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Force Health Protection and Readiness, and the the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Apparently he also found time during his career to work as a counterproliferation officer with the CIA. And among all those plaudits, they still mention that he's a member of the Arizona State Veterinary Medical Examining Board's Investigative Committee.
There are a lot of articles related to Noah's work in public health and the defense establishment. A 2007 article in The Daily Record of Wooster, Ohio, Don Noah, helps build bioterrorism component, discusses Noah's role in building out the Department of Homeland Security's biodefense establishment (link). Starting out as the son of a veterinarian, he was drawn to public health and worked in that capacity while in the military. Noah's background and general niceness made him the only man for the job when Homeland Security came calling for an all-around biodefense expert. He also assisted in interviewing Ebola victims in the 1990s and investigated the 2001 anthrax mailings; he relates that they discovered everything except who sent them. He's also mentioned in a 2020 JAVMA News article, Can veterinarians prevent the next pandemic?, in which veterinarians, having already failed in preventing the current pandemic, proceed to tell us how they're going to prevent the next one (link).
Donald Noah voted to dismiss about 75.9% of complaints in our Tails of Woe.
We've tallied up Donald Noah's votes during the time covered by our public records requests. Of the cases we have, Donald Noah voted in 79 cases. Of those, Donald Noah voted in favor of at least one motion containing the word "dismiss" in 60 of them.
Below we've included Donald Noah's vote breakdowns for up to ten of the most common motions. We also have a detailed list of votes and their associated complaints available in the Voting History.
| Motion | Aye | Nay | Recused | Absent | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dismiss with no violation | 60 | 0 | 4 | 13 | 77 |
| Find violation | 19 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 25 |