Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) is the leading national public health institute of the United States. It is a United States federal agency, under the Department of Health and Human Services, and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia.[2]

Its main goal is to protect public health and safety through the control and prevention of disease, injury, and disability in the US and internationally.[3] The CDC focuses national attention on developing and applying disease control and prevention. It especially focuses its attention on infectious disease, food borne pathogens, environmental health, occupational safety and health, health promotion, injury prevention and educational activities designed to improve the health of United States citizens. The CDC also conducts research and provides information on non-infectious diseases, such as obesity and diabetes, and is a founding member of the International Association of National Public Health Institutes.[4]


Contents
1 History
2 Organization
3 Budget and operations
4 Workforce
4.1 Epidemic Intelligence Service (EIS)
4.2 Public Health Associates Program
5 Leadership
6 Datasets and survey systems
7 Areas of focus
7.1 Communicable diseases
7.1.1 Influenza
7.1.2 Division of Select Agents and Toxins
7.2 Non-communicable diseases
7.3 Antibiotic resistance
7.4 Global health
7.5 Travelers' health
8 Foundation
9 Popular culture and controversies
9.1 Lead contamination in Washington, D.C. drinking water
9.2 Tuskegee Study of Untreated Syphilis in the Negro Male
9.3 CDC zombie apocalypse outreach campaign
9.4 Gun violence
9.5 Language guidelines
10 Publications
11 See also
12 References
12.1 Citations
12.2 Sources
13 External links
History
See also: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention timeline

CDC headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, as seen from Emory University

CDC's Roybal campus in Atlanta, Georgia

Arlen Specter Headquarters and Emergency Operations Center

Tom Harkin Global Communications Center

CDC and MSF staff preparing to enter an Ebola treatment unit in Liberia, August 2014
The Communicable Disease Center was founded July 1, 1946, as the successor to the World War II Malaria Control in War Areas program[5] of the Office of National Defense Malaria Control Activities.[6]

Preceding its founding, organizations with global influence in malaria control were the Malaria Commission of the League of Nations and the Rockefeller Foundation.[7] The Rockefeller Foundation greatly supported malaria control,[7] sought to have the governments take over some of its efforts, and collaborated with the agency.[8]

The new agency was a branch of the U.S. Public Health Service and Atlanta was chosen as the location because malaria was endemic in the Southern United States.[9] The agency changed names (see infobox on top) before adopting the name Communicable Disease Center in 1946. Offices were located on the sixth floor of the Volunteer Building on Peachtree Street.

With a budget at the time of about $1 million, 59 percent of its personnel were engaged in mosquito abatement and habitat control with the objective of control and eradication of malaria in the United States[10] (see National Malaria Eradication Program).

Among its 369 employees, the main jobs at CDC were originally entomology and engineering. In CDC's initial years, more than six and a half million homes were sprayed, mostly with DDT. In 1946, there were only seven medical officers on duty and an early organization chart was drawn, somewhat fancifully, in the shape of a mosquito. Under Joseph Walter Mountin, the CDC continued to advocate for public health issues and pushed to extend its responsibilities to many other communicable diseases.[11