Dr. Joshua Lederberg - scientist, Nobel laureate, visionary thinker, and friend of the Forum on Microbial Threats - died on February 2, 2008. It was in his honor that the Institute of Medicine's Forum on Microbial Threats convened a public workshop on May 20-21, 2008, to examine Dr. Lederberg's scientific and policy contributions to the marketplace of ideas in the life sciences, medicine, and public policy. The resulting workshop summary, Microbial Evolution and Co-Adaptation, demonstrates the extent to which conceptual and technological developments have, within a few short...
Dr. Joshua Lederberg - scientist, Nobel laureate, visionary thinker, and friend of the Forum on Microbial Threats - died on February 2, 2008. It wa...
Modern transportation allows people, animals, and plants--and the pathogens they carry--to travel more easily than ever before. The ease and speed of travel, tourism, and international trade connect once-remote areas with one another, eliminating many of the geographic and cultural barriers that once limited the spread of disease. Because of our global interconnectedness through transportation, tourism and trade, infectious diseases emerge more frequently; spread greater distances; pass more easily between humans and animals; and evolve into new and more virulent strains.
The IOM's...
Modern transportation allows people, animals, and plants--and the pathogens they carry--to travel more easily than ever before. The ease and speed ...
As the human population grows--tripling in the past century while, simultaneously, quadrupling its demand for water--Earth's finite freshwater supplies are increasingly strained, and also increasingly contaminated by domestic, agricultural, and industrial wastes. Today, approximately one-third of the world's population lives in areas with scarce water resources. Nearly one billion people currently lack access to an adequate water supply, and more than twice as many lack access to basic sanitation services. It is projected that by 2025 water scarcity will affect nearly two-thirds of all...
As the human population grows--tripling in the past century while, simultaneously, quadrupling its demand for water--Earth's finite freshwater supp...
Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) afflict more than 1.4 billion people, many of whom live on less than $1.25 a day. While there are effective ways to manage NTDs, policy-makers and funders have only recently begun to recognize the economic and public health importance of controlling NTDs. The IOM's Forum on Microbial Threats held a workshop September 21-22, 2010, to discuss the science of and policy surrounding NTDs.
Neglected tropical diseases (NTDs) afflict more than 1.4 billion people, many of whom live on less than $1.25 a day. While there are effective ways...
Globalization of the food supply has created conditions favorable for the emergence, reemergence, and spread of food-borne pathogens-compounding the challenge of anticipating, detecting, and effectively responding to food-borne threats to health. In the United States, food-borne agents affect 1 out of 6 individuals and cause approximately 48 million illnesses, 128,000 hospitalizations, and 3,000 deaths each year. This figure likely represents just the tip of the iceberg, because it fails to account for the broad array of food-borne illnesses or for their wide-ranging repercussions for...
Globalization of the food supply has created conditions favorable for the emergence, reemergence, and spread of food-borne pathogens-compounding th...
Forum on Microbial Threats Board on Global Health Health and Medicine Division
Pathogens transmitted among humans, animals, or plants by insects and arthropod vectors have been responsible for significant morbidity and mortality throughout recorded history. Such vector-borne diseases a " including malaria, dengue, yellow fever, and plague a " together accounted for more human disease and death in the 17th through early 20th centuries than all other causes combined. Over the past three decades, previously controlled vector-borne diseases have resurged or reemerged in new geographic locations, and several newly identified pathogens and vectors have triggered disease...
Pathogens transmitted among humans, animals, or plants by insects and arthropod vectors have been responsible for significant morbidity and mortali...
Forum on Microbial Threats Board on Global Health Institute Of Medicine
The twentieth century witnessed an era of unprecedented, large-scale, anthropogenic changes to the natural environment. Understanding how environmental factors directly and indirectly affect the emergence and spread of infectious disease has assumed global importance for life on this planet. While the causal links between environmental change and disease emergence are complex, progress in understanding these links, as well as how their impacts may vary across space and time, will require transdisciplinary, transnational, collaborative research. This research may draw upon the expertise,...
The twentieth century witnessed an era of unprecedented, large-scale, anthropogenic changes to the natural environment. Understanding how environme...
Forum on Microbial Threats Board on Global Health Institute Of Medicine
In the past half century, deadly disease outbreaks caused by novel viruses of animal origin - Nipah virus in Malaysia, Hendra virus in Australia, Hantavirus in the United States, Ebola virus in Africa, along with HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), several influenza subtypes, and the SARS (sudden acute respiratory syndrome) and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) coronaviruses - have underscored the urgency of understanding factors influencing viral disease emergence and spread.
Emerging Viral Diseases is the summary of a public workshop hosted in March 2014 to examine...
In the past half century, deadly disease outbreaks caused by novel viruses of animal origin - Nipah virus in Malaysia, Hendra virus in Australia, H...
Forum on Medical and Public Health Prepa Forum on Drug Discovery Development and Forum on Microbial Threats
Emerging infectious disease threats that may not have available treatments or vaccines can directly affect the security of the world's health since these diseases also know no boundaries and will easily cross borders. Sustaining public and private investment in the development of medical countermeasures (MCMs) before an emerging infectious disease becomes a public health emergency in the United States has been extremely challenging. Interest and momentum peak during a crisis and wane between events, and there is little interest in disease threats outside the United States until they impact...
Emerging infectious disease threats that may not have available treatments or vaccines can directly affect the security of the world's health since...
Forum on Microbial Threats Board on Global Health Institute Of Medicine
Since the 2014 Ebola outbreak many public- and private-sector leaders have seen a need for improved management of global public health emergencies. The effects of the Ebola epidemic go well beyond the three hardest-hit countries and beyond the health sector. Education, child protection, commerce, transportation, and human rights have all suffered. The consequences and lethality of Ebola have increased interest in coordinated global response to infectious threats, many of which could disrupt global health and commerce far more than the recent outbreak.
In order to explore the...
Since the 2014 Ebola outbreak many public- and private-sector leaders have seen a need for improved management of global public health emergencies....