Association Of Public Health Laboratories

Ask an American to define the term “public health laboratory,” and you are likely to get a puzzled look. Yet these highly specialized governmental health laboratories protect Their lives daily. Working at the federal, state and local level, public health laboratories monitor and detect health threats ranging from rabies and dengue fever to radiological contaminants, genetic disorders in newborns and terrorist agents. Equipped with sophisticated instrumentation and staffed by highly trained scientists, these unique institutions deliver services that may be unavailable or cost-prohibitive elsewhere. Public health laboratories form the backbone of a national laboratory network on alert 24/7 to respond to novel strains of disease, natural disasters, chemical spills, foodborne outbreaks and other health emergencies. They collaborate closely in these efforts with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other federal agencies including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Department of Homeland Security.