September 24, 2024- We live in a globalized, interconnected world. While this has created enormous opportunities for travel and trade, it’s also increased mankind’s vulnerability to zoonotic diseases through contact with animals. And most infectious diseases come from animals in some capacity, said Dylan George, PhD, director for the Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics (CFA) at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
“What we learned during the COVID pandemic is that the next infectious disease outbreak is only a plane ride away,” Dr. George said.
Indeed, as the pandemic taught us, we are just one incident away from one individual infecting another and causing an outbreak. Having better public health systems and capabilities will make sure that U.S. healthcare stakeholders can better prepare for and ultimately combat those infectious disease outbreaks.
Dr. George said we are at a transformative moment in history. It is an era of pandemics and epidemics throughout our interconnected world. We are also in the middle of a technological renaissance, with new inventions, systems and methods that can enhance our response to healthcare crises.
CFA’s team is tasked with developing the capabilities that will help address those threats in a much more robust way. CFA works with private industry partners, academia, local public health organizations, and other agencies in the federal government to create forecasting tools and other resources to respond to public health emergencies.
Read More in the latest issue of Repertoire Magazine.