To slow the spread of infectious diseases, NSF, NIH, USDA support new research

Scientists will study how diseases are transmitted among humans, other animals and the environment. Emerging pandemic disease outbreaks such as Ebola increasingly threaten global public health and world economies, scientists say. We can expect five such new diseases to emerge each year–and spread. The tropical disease dengue fever, for example, has made its way to Florida and Texas, seemingly to stay. Is our interaction with the environment somehow responsible for the increase in incidence of these diseases? A joint program of the National Science Foundation (NSF), National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is seeking answers. The Ecology and Evolution of Infectious Diseases (EEID) program supports efforts to understand the underlying ecological and biological mechanisms behind human-induced environmental changes and the emergence and transmission of infectious diseases. A complex process The EEID program is also co-funded by the U.K.’s Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC). This year, the program has...