Preparing for Future Viral Outbreaks in a Global Community

After SARS-CoV-2, researchers are concerned about preparing for the next viral outbreak and where the virus will come from. Infectious diseases do not stay isolated for long in modern times because we are a global community. How we prepare for future outbreaks—even pandemics—will require testing, treatment, prevention, and vaccinations worldwide.

Speaking in an exclusive interview with Infection Control Today^® (ICT^®) Ambassador Deborah Birx, MD, discussed her presentation titled, “COVID-19 USA - Lessons and new tools to improve workplace safety" at the "Frontline Worker Safety in the Age of COVID-19: A Global Perspective” a Health Watch USA Webinar on September 14, 2022. In this final installment of the interview, she also expressed her concerns about how future viruses may spread from more tropical climates to wider areas because of climate change and how the world should prepare for them.

Birx is a world-renowned medical expert whose long career has focused on clinical and basic immunology, infectious disease, pandemic preparedness, vaccine research, and global health.

She served the United States as an Army Colonel and later, running some of the most high-profile and influential programs at the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and US Department of State. Birx served as the White House Coronavirus Response Coordinator during the Trump Administration.

“With increasing temperatures, many of these viruses that were isolated to tropical areas may become prominent, and from what were semi-tropical, or even temperate climates,” Birx told ICT^®. “This is a deep concern because as a global population, we have worked so hard to improve treatment to cancer, [and] we've ignored viral diseases, both from their diagnostics and their treatment…we're not making investments for the medium term; we can see that all of these diseases are escalating as climate changes, as the more importantly, as the human population interacts.”

This is the fourth of 4 installments.

The first installment of the interview is here.

The second installment of the interview is here.

The third installment of the interview is here.