Outbreaks: Protecting Americans From Infectious Disease

Item Details

Title

Outbreaks: Protecting Americans From Infectious Disease

Topics

This report tracks improvements and backslides in the US ability to respond to public health emergencies since its inaugural report in 2003.

Date

2017

Conclusions

Many of the improvements since 9/11 and the 2001 anthrax attacks have eroded. Notable agents that pose a threat to biosecurity include anthrax; glanders; melioidosis; botulism toxin; hemorrhagic fever; tularemia; MDR anthrax; typhus; smallpox and plague. Areas in need of improvement are disease surveillance, medical countermeasures development, speed of diagnostics, and the public health workforce.

Source

Segal, L., et al. Outbreaks: Protecting Americans From Infectious Disease. Trust for America's Health. December 2017. https://www.tfah.org/reports/. Accessed March, 2024.

Citation

“Outbreaks: Protecting Americans From Infectious Disease,” Collection of Biothreat Risk Assessments (COBRA), accessed January 15, 2025, https://cobrabiosecurity.org/items/show/516.