| Secretary Marco Rubio U.S. Division of State 2201 C Road NW Washington, D.C. 20520 |
Pricey Secretary Rubio,
On behalf of the 37,000 members of the American Society for Microbiology, I’m writing to precise our deep issues relating to the pausing and potential elimination of U.S. funding for world public well being applications. ASM is likely one of the largest skilled life science societies on this planet and a frontrunner in scientific publishing. By way of our applications and partnerships, we harness the ability of microbiology to serve humanity and clear up probably the most urgent challenges, together with rising infectious illnesses and antimicrobial resistance.
As you evaluate the standing and funding of worldwide public well being applications at USAID and different federal companies, together with U.S. CDC, we urge you to contemplate the possibly dire penalties of eliminating, and even pausing, these applications. International collaboration is paramount to defending public well being. Particularly, we should management and forestall infectious illnesses in low-and middle-income international locations (LMICs) via laboratory techniques strengthening so as to defend Individuals’ well being at residence and overseas.
Pausing or eliminating these important applications impedes U.S.’s skill to collaborate with different nations to actively surveil for rising infectious illnesses, and hampers our nation’s readiness to guard U.S. residents, each domestically and globally. For instance, South Africa’s swift genomic sequencing was instrumental in alerting the world in December 2021 to an uncommon coronavirus genomic profile, the Omicron variant. Current outbreaks of Marburg virus and mpox in Africa are regarding, and ceasing public communications and help not solely threatens the protection of U.S. residents, however can also be an inefficient strategy to U.S.’s management in combating pandemics. When Ebola re-emerged in 2021 in Guinea, CDC-trained workforce in Guinea enabled the top of the outbreak in simply 23 days, in comparison with the 11,000 deaths in West Africa, and value U.S. $2 billion and 10,000+ jobs tied to exports from the 2014-2016 outbreak.
Additional, drastically scaling again these applications will permit current and rising microbial threats, together with antimicrobial resistance (AMR), to flourish. AMR is related to over 5 million deaths world wide yearly and spreads no matter geographic and political boundaries. It’s a elementary risk to world safety and economies, with an annual estimated toll of $855 billion. AMR prevention, detection and surveillance are tantamount to stopping additional unfold all through the U.S., which exceeds 3 million infections and 48,000 deaths yearly.
ASM’s public well being applications allow microbiology laboratories to combine scientific care and infectious illness surveillance in LMICs. These time-bound applications construct self-sustained capability to detect and monitor microbial threats and notify the U.S. of pending outbreaks, and even pandemics. Moreover, focused U.S. investments in well being techniques present a basis for regional stability.
Microbes know no borders. ASM and our members strongly urge you to contemplate instant reinstatement of funding and communications on world public well being applications, for the safety of all. I’d be comfortable to interact in additional conversations relating to potential paths ahead. Please attain out to Amalia Corby, Director of Federal Affairs, at acorby@asmusa.org if you want to rearrange a dialogue.
Sincerely,
Stefano Bertuzzi, Ph.D., MPH, CEO
American Society for Microbiology
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