Uncontrolled Spread: Why COVID-19 Crushed Us and How We Can Defeat the Next Pandemic

by Scott Gottlieb

Yet certainly by mid-December, local officials became aware of an outbreak, and started to zero in on the culprit.31 It became clearer that the episode met the bar for international reporting. These obligations were part of the revised International Health Regulations put in place in 2005, in part as a response to global concerns that China had put other nations in danger by withholding information about the SARS-1 outbreak for too long. Countries promised to be more transparent in the setting of future outbreaks. The new regulations required all 196 countries party to the agreement to improve systems for detecting and reporting dangerous pathogens.32 The agreement also widened the circle of viruses that require immediate reporting to world health authorities.33 One of the central features of this agreement is a stipulation that countries invest in systems to detect outbreaks and report events that may constitute a potential Public Health Emergency of International Concern, or PHEIC as it has come to be known. The CDC explains that under the global compact, a PHEIC is declared by the WHO when two of four criteria are met: Is the public health impact of the event serious? Is the event unusual or unexpected? Is there a significant risk of international spread? Is there a significant risk of international travel or trade restrictions?