Pandemic Center

The Pandemic Center

Informing Action. Training Leaders. Preventing Catastrophe.

The Pandemic Center

Informing Action. Training Leaders. Preventing Catastrophe.

We are in an age of pandemic threats.

COVID-19, the most consequential pandemic in a century, is not our last. The Pandemic Center at the Brown University School of Public Health works to ensure that the world better understands these catastrophic threats, their far-reaching casualties, and develops the tools, policies, and practices to mitigate and prevent their impact. The Pandemic Center is an independent and credible voice for positive disruption.

This Pandemic Center is uniquely positioned to work across disciplines and sectors to generate and analyze evidence, educate a new generation of leaders, and ensure this work is translated to effective policy and practice around the globe.

This Pandemic Center is working to stop pandemics, other biological emergencies, and the harms they pose to health, peace, security, and prosperity.

American Democracy and Pandemic Security

Strengthening the U.S Pandemic Response in a Free Society

Read the report

Evidence to Drive Decision-Making

We are responding to the need to generate, synthesize and translate evidence to better define the most effective policies, practices, and resources to prepare for future infectious disease emergencies and confront the current crisis.

Creating and Impacting Leaders

The Center is dedicated to cross-training a new generation of diverse pandemic leaders and equipping them with the skills and knowledge they need to make change in the world.

Pandemic-Proofing the Future

New Pandemic Center dedicated to studying and preparing for pandemics.

Find out more

Recent News

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The Wall Street Journal

He’s Been Naming Covid Variants. Not Everyone’s Happy.

Excerpt: Naming Omicron subvariants after creatures or asteroids can make them sound more unique or threatening than they are, said Jennifer Nuzzo, director of the Pandemic Center at Brown University’s School of Public Health.

“People think this variant is something we’ve never seen before that we’re not going to have immunity against,” she said. “And that’s not at all true.”
Washington Post

Covid is here to stay. How will we know when it stops being special?

Excerpt: Covid was exceptional in 2020 when it was a new and deadly illness that tore into an unprepared human population. In 2023, widespread immunity — alongside tools such as masks, testing, treatments, updated boosters and improved ventilation — can empower people to protect themselves and others while resuming most normal activities.

“I’m less worried than I was last year, and I was less worried last year than I was the year before,” said Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at Brown University School of Public Health. “But I’m aware, and I’m looking and trying to make sure nothing changes.”
Inverse

Should I Get the New Covid Booster? 6 Important Questions Answered

Excerpt: This updated formula most closely targets the Omicron variant XBB.1.5, but Jennifer Nuzzo, epidemiology professor and director of the Pandemic Center at the Brown University School of Public Health, tells Inverse that it should also protect people against other strains such as EG.5.