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ISDS 2016 Conference Abstracts

Global Health Surveillance: Innovation and 
Coordination for Broad Health Impact
Ray L. Ransom*1, Olga L. Henao1, Leonard Peruski1, Ruth Kigozi2, David Blazes3, 
William Bertrand4 and Joel Montgomery1
1Center for Global Health, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, GA, USA; 2Infectious Disease Research 
Collaboration, Kampala, Uganda; 3Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA, USA; 4School of Public Health and Tropical 
Medicine, Tulane University, New Orleans, LA, USA

Objective
The session will discuss strategies for outbreak prevention, 

detection, and response for global health security and explore how 
these activities inform both domestic and international initiatives. 
Innovations in epidemiology, laboratory, informatics, investment, and 
coordination for disease surveillance will be discussed.

Introduction
Multiple agencies are involved in global disease surveillance and 

coordination of activities is essential to achieve broad public health 
impact. Multiple examples of effective and collaborative initiatives 
exist. The WHO/AFRO developed Integrated Disease Surveillance 
and Response (IDSR) framework, adopted by 43 of the 46 AFRO 
member states and applied in other WHO regions, was the first 
framework designed to strengthen national disease surveillance and 
response systems. The WHO International Health Regulations (IHR) 
2005 are an agreement between 196 countries to prevent, detect 
and respond to the international spread of disease. In 2013 CDC 
worked with Uganda and Vietnam to demonstrate the development 
of surveillance, laboratory, and emergency response center capacity 
and link data systems for six outbreak prone diseases. More recently, 
the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) was launched with the 
support of 28 countries, WHO, OIE and FAO just as Ebola was 
beginning to emerge in West Africa. This panel brings together 
CDC, local implementing partners, academic technical partners, and 
international non-government donor to discuss current and evolving 
strategies for prevention, detection, and response activities needed for 
global health security.

Keywords
Surveillance; Informatics; Laboratory; Data Integration; Global

*Ray L. Ransom
E-mail: rransom@cdc.gov

Online Journal of Public Health Informatics * ISSN 1947-2579 * http://ojphi.org * 9(1):e178, 2017