By Jenny Parker
Health threats are present everywhere, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is called upon to respond to disease outbreaks around the world. In a newly released report, CDC’s Center for Global Health (CGH) takes a deeper dive into its critical global response work, which is essential to protecting us all from dangerous health threats, including COVID-19, which has morphed into a global pandemic.
COVID-19 has killed two million people worldwide, in addition to disrupting the global economy, clearly demonstrating to the world that an infectious disease threat anywhere can become a threat everywhere. CDC’s staff deployed overseas are America’s first line of defense to protect Americans’ health when infectious disease outbreaks that erupt around the world. While CDC is laser-focused on the COVID-19 response, the work to monitor and respond to additional global health threats must continue to ensure the world is prepared for the next, inevitable outbreak. Currently, two-thirds of all countries are not prepared to respond to outbreaks and other public health emergencies.
CGH’s new report highlights recent response efforts and describes how CGH programs are adapting to the COVID-19 pandemic to continue addressing long-standing global infectious disease threats. In 2019, for instance, CGH supported more than 130 outbreak responses in nearly 90 countries, all the while helping to build global capacity for additional health threats. Responses included stopping outbreaks of Ebola, measles, cholera and yellow fever.
As part of the Global Health Security Agenda, CDC serves as the lead technical agency for developing public health workforce, surveillance, laboratory and emergency response capacities globally. Through these and other initiatives, CDC builds capacities needed to respond to existing disease outbreaks and prepare for future threats.
For over 25 years, the CDC Foundation has been supporting CDC to serve as a cross-sector convener and to build public-private partnerships to accomplish more than any one stakeholder or sector can accomplish alone. The time is now for us to leverage all sectors of society to help developing countries improve their basic public health infrastructure. This cross-sector support is needed to prevent or reduce the impact of the next pandemic.
With donor funding, the CDC Foundation over time has supported CDC’s ability to develop partner country response capacity and outbreak detection through multiple projects, many of which are highlighted in this new CGH report. Critical programs like the Field Epidemiology Training Program (FETP) in regions where CDC’s physical presence is limited have been supported.
In one example, the CDC Foundation in partnership with CDC, collaborated with the World Bank and the University of Ouagadougou to host the regional West Africa Field Epidemiology and Laboratory Training Program for the eight French-speaking countries of West Africa (Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo). This two-year training has been adapted to a three-month frontline level. In Burkina Faso, 138 frontline fellows have graduated as of October 2018. Trainees and graduates work locally to communicate crucial information about health problems and make response recommendations.
The CDC Foundation is proud to help extend CDC’s global health preparedness and response efforts by building and sustaining global partnerships. We look forward to continuing to work together with CDC and you to make our world healthier and safer and prepared for the next threat that will inevitably arrive.
Jenny Parker is the vice president for infectious disease programs for the CDC Foundation.
For additional information, including lessons learned and what’s next for CGH in 2021, see CDC’s Center for Global Health Responds to Outbreaks.
Photo at top of page: © Evelyn Hockstein/CDC Foundation
Global Health the same as adverse reaction from climate change.
You want to get your story right. Your story is wrong. You won’t make money from carbon off-sets trading. Dirty air blows away, you’ll spend your own money attempting to create your personal countermeasure for respiratory failure, muscle weakness, digestive failure, neural toxic-symptoms like Parkinson – most of this looks like COVID.
I informed Greta Thunberg it was not true that the politicians did nothing, they tried to kill me. Perhaps you ought to read my father’s headstone: it says “He loved nature.” He was essentially killed using the same tactics used on me, (in 1974). Following his lead, I have been at this “ save a life save a world – my world”. since the fourth grade (1964). I looked exactly like Greta – -green eyes to boot.
Get your story right. Those who can do, those who can’t play politics. I didn’t just develop the above strategies – I detailed the “how to and the engineering and the implementation.” As I recall, Senator Bryd from West VA wanted to spend money washing coal (clean coal) and pour the runoff into water tables). Then my staff was killed in USAir 427. That is for starters how the royal “they” stop saving the planet.
Your payback for ignoring me, today is that 24 people are dead, toda, in Texas, 12 chipanzees froze to death – and that is just today -because unplanned power outages did not provide them a basic habitable cage. Cage’s are evil. So are the people who experimented on them. My work prevented all of this.
Perhaps I am wasting my time speaking to you. Today I am I the High Desert, The UVx index is always over 11 in the summer. Furnace Creek was 134 degrees F last summer. Why is the UVx so high? That is the South Atlantic Anomally letting radiation in from a shift in the earth’s core, caused by excessive mining, drilling fracking, etc (look up Chilie Mning Disaster) which led to the climb in the geomagnetic field.
Our wildlife ingests plastic particulate – no healthy food supply — mass extinction is inevitable because the plastic particulate destroys their endocrine system. It’s not just in human placenta – but I have never been a proponent of man’s dominion over the land, seas, and skies. I belieeve nature live in your eye, not die in your hand.
The butterfly effect (local actions have non local effects) is in full force.
You can pay me to write the story, but observing liars proposing net zero, thirty eight years after I completed the solution is duping your readers. This is not an existential cerise where you rely on politicians telling you what too do and thing. If it is to be, it is put to me and you. Why are you letting politicians infantilize your capacity to make a sound judgement. Do you understandd, your life depends on it!
BTW, I trained under Willard F Rockwell, Jr when “they” didn’t like my commercialization of space transportation system,; they blew up Challenger. Today Elon Musck is benefiting from the results I created. The former POTUS (B.O.) did nothing – except remove my name from my national merit scholarship award (#1 in the USA 19745) – no affirmative action required to be #1. I still am. These are the tactics they have used on me. Including Jennifer Granholm, et al. Washtenaw County sheriff’s report 11/18.06. How is it there in Atlanta? I liked the 485 beltway around the city because I couldn’t breath your air. Take what I say seriously and don’t delete it again.