The Public Health Disaster Research Award Program: Strengthening

The Public Health Disaster Research Award Program: Strengthening the Research Workforce and Advancing Evidence-Based Practice in the US Territories

Posted on June 17, 2025 by Meghan Mordy

This entry is part 11 of 16 in the series July 2025

As seas rise and extreme weather intensifies, the 3.6 million people living in the 5 inhabited US territories—Puerto Rico, the US Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, and the Northern Mariana Islands—are facing more frequent and severe hurricanes, typhoons, flooding, landslides, heat waves, drought, and wildfires. Over the past decade, federal agencies and territorial governments have invested in helping island communities prepare for these natural hazard threats, but those efforts have been slowed by gaps in the public health workforce and data collection infrastructure in the territories.[1] In our latest publication, “Advancing Workforce Development and Evidence-Based Practice in US Territories,” we evaluate a novel research award program designed to build the capacity of investigators to study public health disasters in the US territories.

The Public Health Disaster Research Award Program was established in 2020 by the Natural Hazards Center with support from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The program funds, trains, mentors, and connects researchers, students, and practitioners in historically underserved areas with high natural hazard risk. Between 2020 and 2022, it funded 26 research teams across the US territories with up to $50 000 each. These funds supported the research activities of at least 139 investigators. In 2023, the Natural Hazards Center evaluated the impact of the awards on the investigators and public health preparedness in the US territories.

What We Found

From the outset, the program aimed to strengthen the public health workforce in the US territories by supporting local investigators, students, and early career scholars as well as researchers from a diverse range of disciplines beyond public health. The evaluation showed how the awards reached these groups. Of the 139 funded investigators, 82 were based in the islands (62%) and nearly half (46%) were next generation professionals, including 55 students and 13 early career scholars. Moreover, 87% came from outside public health and belonged to fields ranging across the social and physical sciences, emergency management, engineering, and education.

The Public Health Disaster Research Award Program

Read the Article in JPHMP

Supporting functionally diverse research teams with deep ties to the territories gave rise to projects that had novel perspectives on the islands’ public health problems and solutions. Two projects, for example, identified ways to support trusted messengers who could share evacuation and shelter information during emergencies in island communities. Another set of projects examined how weaknesses in territorial transportation systems and electrical grids put older adults and people with disabilities in harm’s way and how municipalities can better protect these populations in the future. And several teams provided insight into how the territories’ community organizations have been mobilizing to support disaster recovery and preparedness.

Another aim of the program was to address gaps in data collection that have long hampered the ability of territorial governments and their partners to prepare for disasters. Multiple projects brought into focus the needs of the islands’ socially vulnerable populations—including older adults, people with disabilities, children, students, and people living in poverty—who are at increased natural hazard risk. Awards supported 2 research teams in Guam and the US Virgin Islands in constructing those territories’ first-ever social vulnerability indices—tools which are critical to public health and emergency planning across the US, but which had not previously been available in any US territory except Puerto Rico.

As the full article explains in detail, the evaluation showed the awardees were using their awards to advance public health disaster research and generate policy recommendations that were tailored to the territories’ needs and contexts. Other academic institutions or public health agencies can use the Public Health Disaster Research Award Program as a model for strengthening the public health workforce and advancing evidence-based public health policy in underserved areas.

References

[1] McSorley A-M, Wheatley A, Pagán JA. A call to increase health data availability in US Territories—not too small to count. JAMA Health Forum. 2023;4(9):e233088. doi:10.1001/jamahealthforum.2023.3088.

About the Author

Meghan Mordy: Meghan Mordy is a research associate at the Natural Hazards Center at the University of Colorado Boulder and is co-administrator of the Center’s federally funded Research Awards Programs. She earned a PhD in sociology from Colorado State University and Master's degree in Public Administration from University of Washington.