Pandemic Preparedness

Rollins College, Winter Park, Florida — “With Biobot’s data, we can identify the embers of what could become a forest fire.” — Susan Rundell Singer, Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost, Rollins College. A Unique Challenge and Opportunity for Higher Education Across the country, colleges and universities were forced to make difficult decisions about the Fall 2020 semester as a result of the…

More than 32 million people live in Florida and Georgia. Twenty-one million of those people live in Florida, one of America’s fastest-growing states. The two states comprise more than 3% of the population of the Western Hemisphere, and roughly 10% of the U.S. population. Neither state appears to have an…

Hazard pay during this outbreak helps protect U.S. critical infrastructure during future outbreaks During the COVID-19 outbreak, essential workers have maintained U.S. critical infrastructure, including the healthcare system, the food supply system, and the electricity and water distribution systems. But what if the next outbreak was much more deadly? Would…

A Business Continuity Plan (BCP) provides ways to keep immediately the business operations with the least impact as possible while a Pandemic Preparedness Plan (PPP) is a living document that gives guidance on how an organization is prepared to respond to an acute threat on public health. Businesses have had…

This is a reproduction of our WHO award-winning 2017 essay, which can be found here. We have decided to reproduce to promote discussion in the current pandemic. AUTHORS Lisa Parvin, MS, School of Population and Public Health, University of British Columbia Daniela Valdés, MSc, Economics (UCL), Global Healthcare Delivery Specialist…

The next outbreak? We’re not ready. This is the title to one of the most popular TED talks by Bill Gates. In his speech, Gates highlighted that the failure to prepare for the next epidemic could allow the next epidemic to be dramatically more devastating than Ebola. Five years later…

South Korea was one of the first countries outside of China to be seriously impacted by COVID-19. As at 16 March, a total of 8,236 people have tested positive for COVID-19. Of these, 75 people have died and 1,173 have been discharged. …