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Division of Foodborne, Bacterial and Mycotic Diseases (DFBMD)

About DFBMD

The Division of Foodborne, Bacterial and Mycotic Diseases (DFBMD) is dedicated to prevention and controlling the many emerging, reemerging, drug-resistant, and other important bacterial and mycotic diseases in the United States and around the world.

Changes in society, technology, our environment, and microorganism themselves are affecting the occurrence of foodborne, bacterial and mycotic diseases. For example, E. coli 0157 first emerged in the 1980s and spread through complex ecologies to contaminate a growing variety of foods. Multi-resistant Salmonella are a growing challenge to human and animal health. Fungal infections are common among immuno-compromised patients, and are difficult to diagnose and treat. Infections of animals like anthrax, leptospirosis, and brucellosis can spread to humans by direct contact and by less obvious routes. Microbial adaptation is leading to new or previously unrecognized pathogens.

The activities of the Division are focused on improving the identification of these pathogens, better understanding the pathways by which they make people sick, and using this information to improve prevention. The Division develops and evaluates better methods for surveillance, investigation, and preventions in close collaboration with the state health departments, academic researchers, other federal agencies and, and partnerships around the world.

The Division's branches are responsible for investigation, surveillance, and control of specific groups of diseases. Two of the branches provide the epidemiological and microbiological expertise for foodborne and other intestinal infections, collectively called enteric infections. In two other branches, epidemiology and laboratory sections collaborate to provide clinical and epidemiologic information on disease outbreaks and identification, diagnostic-test development, virulence determination, and antimicrobial susceptibility testing of the pathogens involved. A biostatistical group supports the statistical activities, a food safety office coordinates foodborne disease activities across all of CDC, and a health education group supports a variety of education efforts.

Page last modified: November 05, 2007
Content Source: National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases (ZVED)

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Contact Information

1600 Clifton Road NE
MS-C09
Atlanta, GA 30333
Phone: +1-800-311-1603