As Fischer and Wohl Fight Disease in Sub-Saharan Africa, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) Selects UNC to be a Regional Emerging Special Pathogen Treatment Center (RESPTC). See press announcement.
Many courageous infectious disease specialists and other clinicians have not shied away from caring for those in need, even in the hot zones. These efforts require clever and creative work, like the kind demonstrated during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A pop-up Respiratory Diagnosis Clinic (RDC) went up over a weekend, COVID-19 testing was carried out in rural areas by way of North Carolina’s back roads, and, as remarkable, UNC’s state-of-the-art Surveillance Laboratory was built in 9 weeks, becoming Carolina’s frontline defense against COVID-19.
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Now, UNC will become a regional expert in civilian biodefense, joining Emory University, as the only two RESPTCs in the Southeast. William Fischer, MD, an associate professor in the Division of Pulmonary Diseases and Critical Care Medicine and the director of the Emerging Pathogens Program at the Institute for Global Health & Infectious Diseases, David Wohl, MD, professor of medicine in the Division of Infectious Diseases and lead of the IGHID Global Infectious Diseases Clinical Research Unit at Chapel Hill, and UNC colleagues will lead a Regional Emerging Special Pathogen Treatment Center funded through the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services’ Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response.
UNC is one of three sites selected to expand beyond 10 existing RESPTC sites across the US. Two other new centers will be established at Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C. and Spectrum Health System in Grand Rapids, Michigan.
[Read more on the Institute for Global Health and Infectious Disease’s website]