News Release
Nation's Health Security Research Is Not Balanced Enough to Meet Broad Safety Goals
Dec 3, 2012
Federal support for health security research is heavily weighted toward preparing for bioterrorism and other biological threats, providing significantly less funding for challenges such as monster storms or attacks with conventional bombs.
Other Priorities Get Scant Attention
Published in: Health Affairs, v. 31, no. 12, Dec. 2012, p. 2755-2763
Posted on RAND.org on December 01, 2012
The federal government plays a critical role in achieving national health security by providing strategic guidance and funding research to help prevent, respond to, mitigate, and recover from disasters, epidemics, and acts of terrorism. In this article we describe the first-ever inventory of nonclassified national health security–related research funded by civilian agencies of the federal government. Our analysis revealed that the US government's portfolio of health security research is currently weighted toward bioterrorism and emerging biological threats, laboratory methods, and development of biological countermeasures. Eight of ten other priorities identified in the Department of Health and Human Services' National Health Security Strategy—such as developing and maintaining a national health security workforce or incorporating recovery into planning and response—receive scant attention. We offer recommendations to better align federal spending with health security research priorities, including the creation of an interagency working group charged with minimizing research redundancy and filling persistent gaps in knowledge.
This report is part of the RAND Corporation External publication series. Many RAND studies are published in peer-reviewed scholarly journals, as chapters in commercial books, or as documents published by other organizations.
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