Navigating the CDC Website and Other Resources
Welcome back! Today we’re touring the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) website to familiarize ourselves with the resources available. If you’re new to the industry or in an industry regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), understanding the tools and resources provided by the CDC will help you understand and meet the FDA’s expectations as well as stay compliant for donor screening and patients receiving these lifesaving products and therapies. CDC has a network of country and regional offices in over 60 countries [1] ! The CDC’s website provides a plethora of resources but knowing where to find items can be daunting!
For this blog, we’ll focus on a few main areas, here is an overview on navigating the CDC’s website and a few other resources for those in the cellular and biologics space, tissue, medical devices, and drugs (pharma), starting with CDC’s website: https://www.cdc.gov/ [1]. Once in the CDC’s website, a quick keyword search in the search bar will query all items published and available by the CDC.
CDC Stacks is an archival repository of previously published information (journals and statistics) provided to the public, here’s the website: https://stacks.cdc.gov/ [2] .
Looking for older information to identify how the data will shape your potential process impacted by screening or qualifying donors? The CDC Archive Site contains this information, although keep in mind that this information is for historical purposes only and hasn’t been updated since its publication, check out the info here:
If you didn’t know, you can sign up for specific email notifications from the CDC, some are sent weekly and some monthly depending on the topic. Having a heads up on potential impacts will help your organization prepare and plan for industry changes and challenges that impact business strategies. For the latest news such as emerging infectious diseases, journals and publications, environmental health and more, sign up here:
https://tools.cdc.gov/campaignproxyservice/subscriptions.aspx [4]
Next, we’ll dive into additional resources that may help your establishment maintain vigilance in the field for potential emergence of infectious disease that may impact future guidance documents and shape criteria from screening of donors to product distribution.
Other Resources:
1. For all donor screening, travel is a major factor for donation eligibility. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) is the European Union (EU) agency who alsoworks with WHO and the U.S. CDC, oversees and coordinates important urgent scientific and public health matters by identifying, assessing, and communicating current and emerging threats to human health posed by infectious disease, learn more about them here: https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en [5] .Use their search bar criteria to learn more about specific diseases for a particular country that may impact travel screening.
2. The World Health Organization (WHO) is an organization of multiple countries (Member States) from the United Nations who lead global efforts to promote healthier lives using science-based policies and programs. They are dedicated to global health and safety on international health issues including public health emergencies https://www.who.int/ [6]
Ex. Malaria Data map, check here: https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/malaria [7]
To learn more about specific diseases from decades of data, check out WHO’s Fact sheets here: https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets [8]
For the latest Disease Outbreak News (DONS), check out their articles here: https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news [9] (and you can sign up for notifications if interested here as well)
3. The Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention (AfricaCDC) is the continental autonomous health agency of the African Union supporting public health initiatives of Member States and strengthen the capacity of their public health institutions to detect, prevent, control, and respond quickly and effectively to disease threats, check them out here at their website: https://africacdc.org/about-us/ [10] . Use their search bar criteria to learn more about specific diseases for a particular country that may impact travel screening.
4. The Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) works with the U.S. CDC to strengthening the public health in Mexico, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean, more information can be found here: https://www.paho.org/en/partnerships/centers-disease-control-and-prevention-cdc-protecting-people-health-threats [11]. Use their search bar criteria to learn more about specific diseases for a particular country that may impact travel screening.
5. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and plays a key role for medical research and public health. Their mission is to seek fundamental knowledge about the nature and behavior of living systems and the application of that knowledge to enhance health, lengthen life, and reduce illness and disability [12] .
For research initiative and training, check out this NIH link here: https://www.nih.gov/research-training [13] .
6. Need published data or literature resources to support methodologies, product development, and more? Check out research papers and studies at PubMed Central: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/ [14] . This free digital archive of biomedical and life science journal articles are part of the NIH. If you’re looking for full text articles, be sure to filter and narrow by “free full text” and this will provide resources that are full versions and free!
Did you know that the CDC published a resource called the “CDC Yellow Book: Health Information for International Travel”? It’s a resource for health professionals providing care to international travelers. It compiles the US government’s most current travel health guidelines, including pretravel vaccine recommendations, destination-specific health advice, and easy-to-reference maps, tables, and charts, you can find a summary of it here: CDC Yellow Book [15] . In addition to this, they also published, “The Epidemiology and Prevention of Vaccine-Preventable Diseases (also known as CDC Pink Book)” which provides physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, pharmacists, and other healthcare professionals with the most comprehensive information on routinely used vaccines and the diseases they prevent, check out the summaries for the content here: CDC Pink Book [16] .
Multiple resources are available throughout the CDC and other resources websites, reach out and let us know if you need help! Be sure to stop back and check out our next latest blog!
Resources and Links:
4 https://tools.cdc.gov/campaignproxyservice/subscriptions.aspx
5 https://www.ecdc.europa.eu/en
7 https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/malaria
8 https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets
9 https://www.who.int/emergencies/disease-outbreak-news
10 https://africacdc.org/about-us/
12 https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/what-we-do/mission-goals
13 https://www.nih.gov/research-training
14 https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/
15 https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/travel/yellowbook/2024/table-of-contents
16 https://www.cdc.gov/pinkbook/hcp/table-of-contents/index.html