Preparedness

About preparedness

Preparedness involves proactively anticipating, detecting, monitoring and readying for potential and emerging infectious disease health threats.

It involves:

ensuring diagnostic testing capability and capacity
monitoring disease trends through surveillance systems
identifying, preventing and managing emerging disease threats
interpreting evidence quickly
strong working relationships to support collaboration
timely access to, and delivery of, information
an effective communication system.

Why it's important

Our preparedness work helps:

protect the health of Australians and minimise harm
identify early public health action needed to manage emerging disease threats before they escalate, to reduce their impact
protect priority populations
improve speed and coordination across governments during major health threats such as pandemics
build public confidence in Australia’s readiness to respond to public health threats.

What we’re doing

Horizon scanning

We monitor global and domestic information sources, including:

scientific research
global surveillance systems
expert networks
global health platforms
real‑world observations.

This helps us detect early signals, such as:

emerging novel diseases
new disease variants
disease outbreaks
misinformation trends.

We might use this information to:

assess risk to determine what action is required, if any
develop advice to government
strengthen preparedness and response plans, including for priority populations
update surveillance priorities
develop or update public health policy and messaging.

Communicable disease surveillance

We monitor and report on nationally notifiable diseases and domestic and international signals from perennial and emerging diseases that might pose a risk to Australia.

This helps us to:

identify trends in disease activity, impact and severity
provide evidence-informed advice
minimise the impacts of communicable diseases.

Read more about our disease surveillance work.

Pandemic preparedness

As part of our pandemic preparedness work, we:

are developing the strategic direction to guide our preparedness to major infectious disease outbreaks
are designing and establishing the National Wastewater Surveillance Program to monitor priority pathogens of pandemic potential
report annually to the Australian Government Minister for Health on the status of Australia’s readiness for a pandemic
share information with national, state and territory health departments
take part in exercises and scenario modelling to test and improve Australia’s pandemic response capabilities.
regulate the handling of certain high-risk biological agents
work with various subcommittees that report to the Australian Health Protection Committee (AHPC) to reduce emerging health threats.