With the investment of $26 million announced this week, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) hopes to modernize the science of infectious disease prediction and analytics.
The first investments from CDC’s Center for Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics (CFA) — which is expected to formally launch in early 2022 — these funds will benefit both academic and federal research and development of advanced infectious disease models and analytical tools. Projects will result in new means and methods of analyzing data for use in public health decision-making, new tools and programs to train infectious disease modelers, and greater understanding and development of evidence-based strategies to address health inequities during outbreaks.
“These investments will improve the nation’s ability to forecast infectious-disease outbreaks and to better inform local leaders on how to respond,” Dylan George, CFA director for Operations, said. “We are excited to work with the renowned experts on these needed projects.”
The bulk of funds — $21 million — will go to the academic side, supporting three years of work at the University at Albany, State University of New York; Johns Hopkins University; Stanford University; the University of Utah and Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. The remaining $5 million will support collaborations with the National Science Foundation and the U.S. Department of Energy.
Additionally, the CFA intends to provide modeling and analytical capabilities to federal, state, tribal, territorial, and local partners going forward. All funds were provided by the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021.