Resource Type: Journal Article
Authors:  C. James Hospedales & Lisa Tarantino
Published: March 8, 2018

Resource Description: Recent multicountry infectious disease outbreaks of Ebola (2014) and Zika (2016–present) have raised global awareness of the importance of health security and the systems and capacities needed to prevent, detect, and respond to global health threats. Several mechanisms exist through which individual countries can plan and frame health security strengthening, such as the World Health Organization’s (WHO) International Health Regulations (IHR), the Joint External Evaluation tool, and the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA). The IHR came into force in 2007, manifested in the form of bilateral agreements between individual countries and the WHO. They aim to reduce the spread of diseases internationally while minimizing disruption of travel and trade. Regional and multisectoral cooperation, however, has not yet been systematized or institutionalized in a manner befitting a security threat that crosses borders easily and indiscriminately. We know that an infected individual can travel from country to country and continent to continent in a matter of hours—and that health security is unachievable without a regional coordinated response.

Original Post Found here:  https://doi.org/10.1080/23288604.2018.1446123