National Security and Public Health Systems

Posted on February 28, 2024 by Nikki Weiss

This entry is part 43 of 43 in the series Wide World of Public Health Systems

The National Security Council (NSC) — chaired by POTUS and regularly attended by the heads of the executive departments — does not have a permanent public health subject matter expert. This suggests that our federal government underestimates the role that public health plays in national security, despite the fact that more than a dozen states are capable of leading a bioweapon attack. It’s not a leap, then, to presume that public health systems are not prioritized in NSC proceedings. This subject is not completely ignored, of course, but even when public health is taken into consideration, it is not done effectively. (Recall the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and the issues with the national stockpile of personal protective equipment.) In this blog post, I’ll discuss why this is a problem. In other words, how could prioritizing a robust public health system allow the United States to prevent and respond to national security threats?

First, a fully staffed public health workforce directly mitigates the spread of disease among our national security leadership. When our leaders are healthy, they can attend in-person meetings to discuss classified information that cannot be easily or safely shared by large numbers of remote workers. When our leaders are not healthy, the national security system is at risk of collapsing. Just look to Dark Winter, a mock response exercise held a couple months before 9/11. Originally supposed to last multiple days, the exercise ended a mere eight hours into gameplay because the smallpox scenario imploded national security leadership infrastructure.

Second, preventing mass disease means a generally more robust national citizenry and workforce, which buffers against economic instability and other factors like supply chain disruptions (eg, agriculture, medicine, computer chips) that could make our country vulnerable to various types of attacks. For example, if one-third of the population is out of commission due to a pandemic, we then have one-third fewer experts to respond to cybersecurity threats such as hacks of critical digital infrastructure. Furthermore, this potential biological threat — as we saw with COVID-19 — draws resources away from the military, which should be using those same resources elsewhere to mitigate safety risks, domestic and abroad. With resources scarce and buffers withdrawn, we risk shocks to our institutions that could collapse them.

Third, a fully funded public health workforce allows for public health workers to successfully counter disinformation campaigns by nefarious actors. Due to the rise in reach of social media, misinformation has proven to be a valuable weapon that threatens national security. It is now more important than ever to expand the role of public information officers in the discipline of public health so that they may communicate with citizens and manage the crisis properly.

These threats to public health aren’t going away anytime soon, especially considering the bare minimum we are doing to address climate change and its causes, many of which are known to be associated with increased spread of diseases. However, if left unchecked, these public health threats have the potential to jeopardize our national security as well. As Captain Pietro D. Marghella, US Navy (Retired) puts it: “Public health does not get a seat at the table when it comes to addressing national security issues. In fact, public health has never really been treated as a national security concern. This is a fatal mistake.”

Author Profile

Nikki Weiss: Nikki Weiss is a biocultural anthropologist specializing in mixed methods research. She completed her undergraduate education in biology at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, and she earned her master’s and doctorate in anthropology from Ohio State University. Before arriving at CPHS, Nikki worked for the Johns Hopkins Center for Indigenous Health – Great Lakes Hub, as well as for the CDC Foundation. Her research interests include health equity and making health care accessible and attainable for all.