{"id":22503,"date":"2026-07-30T23:48:08","date_gmt":"2026-07-30T18:48:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22503"},"modified":"2026-07-30T23:48:08","modified_gmt":"2026-07-30T18:48:08","slug":"federal-infectious-disease-surveillance-is-hampered-by-split-oversight-report","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=22503","title":{"rendered":"Federal infectious disease surveillance is hampered by split oversight: Report"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<br \/><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/twt-thumbs.washtimes.com\/media\/image\/2026\/07\/17\/Cyclospora_Outbreak_History_47169_s1440x960.jpg?f72536d07237fdd262042ae8f5e6e6de3b865f3c\" \/><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>The government is poorly equipped to detect emerging infectious diseases across human and animal populations because federal surveillance efforts remain fragmented, according to a new report.<\/p>\n<p>Agencies rely on informal coordination rather than centralized leadership, prompting experts to recommend sweeping changes to how the government monitors outbreaks before they spread, according to <a href=\"https:\/\/files.gao.gov\/reports\/GAO-26-107610\/index.html\" rel=\"noopener\" target=\"_blank\">a new Government Accountability Office report.<\/a><\/p>\n<p>The report comes amid a growing outbreak of cyclosporiasis and a record-breaking number of measles cases in the U.S.<\/p>\n<p>No agency has centralized authority to direct cross-agency surveillance, as coordination efforts are described as largely informal or based on \u201cpersonal relationships.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The U.S. One Health Coordination Unit, a working group on interagency surveillance, was affected by the disorganization during the New World Screwworm response.<\/p>\n<p>Experts recommended creating a centralized, multisectoral One Health leadership group to direct cross-agency surveillance.<\/p>\n<p>They told GAO that the federal lead for public health, the Department of Health and Human Services, can improve U.S. emerging infectious disease surveillance by unifying efforts between animal and human health sectors, as emerging diseases often affect both.<\/p>\n<aside>\n<\/aside>\n<p>Zoonotic diseases \u2014 those that spread between humans and animals \u2014 account for 75% of emerging infectious diseases, making animal-human unification central to the surveillance mission, according to the report.<\/p>\n<p>Currently, \u201cpublic health agencies focus on human disease surveillance while animal health agencies focus on animal disease surveillance,\u201d as each optimizes data collection for their own agency\u2019s needs rather than a shared surveillance goal. Even where informal collaboration exists, it\u2019s ad hoc and not durable.<\/p>\n<p>Experts called for a group that spans public health and animal health agencies with real authority \u2014 not just another informal coordinating body.<\/p>\n<p>HHS\u2019 leadership and coordination of public health emergencies has been on GAO\u2019s \u201cHigh Risk List\u201d since 2022. During COVID-19, the data that HHS relied on was \u201cincomplete and inconsistent,\u201d landing the department on GAO\u2019s list.<\/p>\n<p>During the 2022 mpox outbreak, HHS \u201cdid not effectively communicate\u201d the \u201csignificantly increased risk of mpox for certain individuals\u201d and failed to adapt messaging for different communities. GAO notes this is the same pattern seen in COVID-19, the 2016 Zika response and 2009 H1N1.<\/p>\n<p>Reduced public trust has made people less willing to get tested or report infections, degrading data quality further, according to the report.<\/p>\n<p>                        <a name=\"pagebreak\"\/><\/p>\n<p>As of January of last year, 83 recommendations related to public health emergency preparedness remained unimplemented.<\/p>\n<section class=\"author-contact-section\">\n<\/section><\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The government is poorly equipped to detect emerging infectious diseases across human and animal populations because federal surveillance efforts remain fragmented, according to a new report. Agencies rely on informal coordination rather than centralized leadership, prompting experts to recommend sweeping changes to how the government monitors outbreaks before they spread, according to a new Government&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22504,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/twt-thumbs.washtimes.com\/media\/image\/2026\/07\/17\/Cyclospora_Outbreak_History_47169_c0-0-3000-1750_s1200x700.jpg?8fcc827e3d5c4d025cb0728722f014f10701a927","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-22503","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-hub"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22503","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22503"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22503\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22504"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22503"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22503"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22503"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}