Emerging Pandemic Threats Program

Question 1

USAID provides technical and financial assistance programs in

Answer 1

• global health
• agriculture and food security
• education, gender equality and humanitarian assistance
• environment, economic growth, democracy, special assistance programs

Question 2

Role of USAID

Answer 2

Promote social and economic progress in developing countries

Question 3

USAID offices

Answer 3

Eastern Europe, Asia, South America, Middle East, Africa

Question 4

2 USAID programs of relevance to vet medicine

Answer 4

• bureau for global health: improve quality, availability and delivery of basic/essential health services
• bureau for food security: interventions in sustainable livestock agriculture to enhance incomes and achieve global food security

Question 5

Human activities and impacts on global health and food security

Answer 5

Human activities –> demands on food production systems –> adverse health outcomes

• increasing human population, rapid urbanization and rising incomes all leads to increase in demand for animal source foods
• changing trends in livestock production, pressures on natural habitats and ecosystems, and climate associated drivers of EIDs all have adverse impacts on human health

Question 6

USAID Bureau for global health - 3 priorities

Answer 6

• preventing child and maternal deaths
• controlling HIV/AIDS epidemic
• combating infectious diseases: global zoonotic pandemics, multi-drug TB, neglected tropical diseases

Question 7

Bureau for food security

Answer 7

• objective: develop strategies for sustainable and resilient global food systems
• outcome: increase agricultural production to efficiently and equitably combat global hunger, poverty and malnutrition

Question 8

Global EID pandemics

Answer 8

• ebola
• MERS
• marburg
• zika
• swine influenza
• avian influenza
• SARS
• west nile
• nipah and hendra virus

Question 9

SARS

Answer 9

Febrile atypical respiratory illness

• progresses rapidly to respiratory failure
• health workers at risk, antibiotic resistant
• spread from Asia to Europe/America
• guidelines on airline screening to decrease risk of global spread of SARS

Question 10

SARS etiology

Answer 10

Coronavirus
- determined etiology from SARS Hong Kong patient: infected cynomologus macaques –> reproduced signs similar to SARS in humans –> re-isolated infectious agent and infected new macaques

Question 11

Lessons from SARS pandemic

Answer 11

• EIDs have devastating impacts –> loss of life, uncertainty and economic consequences
• importance of information and communication during EID events
• need for international efforts to bring EID under control

Question 12

Global response to avian influenza

Answer 12

International platform to prioritize AI, mobilize resources, increase transparency in disease reporting, improve surveillance and build local capacity to identify, contain and respond to future epidemics

Question 13

USAID established EPT

Answer 13

Approach: strengthen national capacity in Africa, Asia and Latin America through One Health
- predict, prevent, identify, respond!!

Question 14

Objective of EPT

Answer 14

• strengthen country-level capacity for routine infectious disease detection and outbreak response
• improve surveillance and response, in addition to risk mitigation strategies, minimization of practices and behaviors that trigger spill over and spread

Question 15

Goal of EPT

Answer 15

To safeguard human and animal health and livelihoods in 20 developing countries where pandemic zoonoses are most likely to emerge

Question 16

Predict

Answer 16

• detection and discovery of zoonotic pathogens at the wildlife human interface
• strengthen surveillance and laboratory capacity for monitoring public health threats

Question 17

Prevent

Answer 17

• characterization of specific practices and behaviors that increase the risk of exposure to zoonoses (bushmeat hunting and butchering, raising wildlife for trade and consumption)
• risk mitigation tool for extractive industry workers to decrease exposure to EIDs (minimization of wildlife disturbance, monitor employee health, community health programs, animal source protein access)

Question 18

Identify

Answer 18

• improving lab assessment tools to allow for better targeting of technical support and training
• developing training modules on diagnosing highly infectious diseases
• improving lab management practices related to biosecurity and biocontainment
• twinning labs in developed countries with those in developing countries
• expanding activities to monitor antibiotic resistance

Question 19

Respond

Answer 19

• networking 34 schools of public health, vet med and environment in SE Asia and Africa
• development of an outbreak response algorithm for health events where the cause has not been identified
• supporting outbreak response when requested

Question 20

Global trends

Answer 20

Increasing human population, rapid urbanization, rising incomes = new stresses on livestock production systems

Question 21

New approaches to increase livestock production have led to

Answer 21

• food safety hazards (infectious and chemical)
• antimicrobial resistance
• foodborne zoonoses

Question 22

Core competencies

Answer 22

• experience working/living abroad
• cultural awareness
• foreign language skills
• effective communication
• experience with broad, systemic issues
• economic, management and policy background
• development background