The White House plans to expand coordination and support to 50 countries in a new worldwide effort to spot and stop pandemic risks.
The Biden administration will work with other countries on a new effort to improve infectious disease testing and surveillance before outbreaks can threaten to become global pandemics.
The partnership is meant to deliver national defense benefits for America and its global interests.
But the White House notes that "The most effective way to mitigate the impact of health security threats is to prevent, detect and contain them at their source. The Strategy focuses on working with countries around the world to ensure they are better able to prevent, detect, and respond to global health security threats."
The new expansion will reach more countries in Africa and Asia, where it will work to reduce the burden on health systems and workers that comes not just from COVID-19, but also from ongoing outbreaks of mpox, Ebola, cholera, polio, dengue, and malaria.
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Multiple U.S. agencies will lend their support, including the U.S. State Department, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Department of Health and Human Services and the U.S. Agency for International Development.
The new U.S. effort is not meant to replace other international agreements, such as the pandemic response accord in the works at the World Health Organization. A senior administration official said the U.S. program would go forward regardless of other global mitigation efforts.
