Bill Foege

At least 300 million people died in the 20th century because of smallpox, according to The World Health Organization. In 1966, a global program was initiated by WHO. The U.S. Agency for International Development financed the first project: the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s effort to eliminate smallpox in 20 countries of West and central Africa.

In 2018, an extraordinary gathering of leaders took place in Atlanta. United by a shared vision, they embarked on an inspiring journey: to elevate the city as a global health powerhouse. Today, we have the opportunity to realize that vision, but we must take collective action to make it a reality. At the gathering five years ago, the Metro Atlanta Chamber, Georgia Global Health Alliance, and Deloitte invited multi-sector leaders to come together.

Health workers prepare to collect swab samples for COVID-19 tests | PTI Text Size: For many global health decision-makers, COVID-19 has come to symbolize a failure to apply lessons from past experiences with infectious diseases and raised pressing new questions to be addressed ahead of the next pandemic.