Pacific Rim
Economic Ties Spur
Emerging Infections NetworkThe participating countries have begun sharing national level and other data about MDRTB. Indonesia, for example, is sending data from the major referral hospital in Jakarta. A key component of the Web site is a detailed "methods" page that identifies and describes the origin of and quality issues for all data appearing in the table so that scientists can accurately interpret the information. At present only authorized individuals in the participating economies can access this password protected site, but the goal is to expand access as the system matures.
APEC EINet Project Team Ann Marie Kimball, M.D., M.PH. (principal investigator) Department of Health Services, UW School of Public Health
Patrick O'Carroll, M.D., M.PH. (co-investigator), Northwest Center for Public Health Practice
Carrie Horwitch, M.D., M.PH. Division of Infectious Disease, LJW School of Medicine
Charles Nolan, M.D. Tuberculosis Control Program, Seattle-King County Health Dept.
John Kobayashi, M.D., M.PH. Division of Epidemiology, Washington State Department of Health
Laura Larsson, M.L.S. Department of Health Services, UW School of Public Health
Staff. *Ya-Shin Lin, M.PH., Research Coordinator; *Laura Schubert, M.A. Project Coordinator; *Phillip Dunham, M.A., Data Operations Coordinator; Clifford Meyer M.PA., Communications Manager (*Northwest Center for Public Health Practice)
International cooperation in the economic arena can lead to associated dividends of cooperation in public health and disease prevention. A prime example is the new Emerging Infections Network established under the auspices of the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) group. Founded in 1989 to promote economic development of the entire region, APEC, with 18 member countries (referred to as "economies," sidebar), represents 42% of the world's population and 55% of total world income. Western Hemisphere membership includes Canada, the United States, Mexico, and Chile. Explosive growth in trade and travel in the Asia Pacific region and economically motivated migration are hastening the pace of macro-level ecological changes and coincident changes in microbial ecology. Actions to prevent epidemics and disease clusters of new and reinvigorated infections will need to be formulated and tested through multidisciplinary collaboration and will require participation of various sectors within APEC economies.
The Emerging Infections Network was established at the University of Washington in July 1996 by scientists from five APEC economies and is funded as a cooperative agreement between the UW and the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The project has three primary aims: (1) to enhance existing communications links and test a surveillance network for emerging and reemerging infections in the APEC economies; (2) to increase and strengthen collaborations between academicians, policy makers, and commercial interests concerned about the effect of emerging infectious diseases on interactions between APEC member states; and (3) to add health and medical information to the evolving APEC Educational Telecommunications Network (APEC EduNET) based at the University of Washington.
Through the Internet, EduNET electronically links institutions of higher learning in the member economies and will significantly expand information exchange throughout the region. At our Internet site we are building access to information resources, disease surveillance data, and didactic materials for distance learning.
To date, the cooperative agreement has allowed us to bring scientists from Indonesia the Philippines, Thailand, Canada, and the United States into a focused dialogue about the emergence of new and reinvigorated diseases in the region. At the July 1996 meeting, representatives of these economies emphasized their strong common interest in addressing multidrug-resistant tuberculosis (MDRTB) as a priority for disease surveillance and information exchange. Subsequent team site visits to Thailand and Indonesia confirmed the importance of this goal. We are working with our colleagues to develop appropriate and useful formats for sharing information and are creating a mechanism to ensure the quality and accuracy of information and the security of the Internet site. Our project also receives in-kind support from the World Health Organization in Geneva and its Southeast Asia regional office.
In March 1997 we presented the project to APEC's International Working Group on Science and Technology during its meetings in Vancouver, Canada, with a proposal for a formal planning meeting in 1998. Even at this early phase, collaborations among participating scientists are leading to "spin-off' technical projects. The scientists may be geographically thousands of miles apart, but they are united by the Internet and a common public health goal. For further information, visit the EINet Web Site.
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Created: 3/12/98 Updated: 7/14/99
