Everyone wants to know "what can we do better to prepare for future pandemics?"

As someone in the field of biopreparedness & infectious disease emergency management we& #39;ve long advocated to end the "boom-and-bust cycle of federal spending"

We pour in $ during an emergency & later have it dissolve. Case in point - Ebola 2014, Zika 2016 and many more. There& #39;s no sustainment in funding.

@RonaldKlain and I highlighted this December of 2019 in the @washingtonpost Op Ed: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/a-program-protecting-us-from-deadly-pandemic-is-about-to-expire/2019/12/27/7c216c26-2280-11ea-bed5-880264cc91a9_story.html">https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/...

Along with cuts to public health funding, the Hospital Preparedness Program (HPP) which specifically aims at strengthening healthcare preparedness for public health emergencies has endured substantial cuts over the years. https://apnews.com/e28724a125a127f650a9b6f48f7bb938">https://apnews.com/e28724a12...

Federal funding for hospital preparedness peaked at $515 million in 2004 and has plummeted since then, to $276 million this year. https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/2020/05/02/hospital-preparedness-coronavirus-federal-funds/?arc404=true">https://www.washingtonpost.com/investiga...

What does COVID19, SARS, Zika, Ebola, etc all have in common?

They& #39;re not one off events. And we should expect more of these type of epidemics + pandemics.

We must invest in public health and health care systems.