Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response

Public Health Preparedness Capabilities:
National Standards for State and Local Planning

DSLR Capabilities document cover One of the nation's key preparedness challenges has been determining appropriate state and local public health preparedness priorities. To assist state and local public health departments in their strategic planning, CDC developed 15 capabilities to serve as national public health preparedness standards.

CDC applied a systematic approach to developing the public health preparedness capabilities. The content is based on evidence-informed documents, relevant preparedness literature, and subject matter expertise gathered from across the federal government and the state and local practice community.

CDC's Public Health Preparedness Capabilities: National Standards for State and Local Planning now provides a guide that state and local jurisdictions can use to better organize their work, plan their priorities, and decide which capabilities they have the resources to build or sustain. The capabilities also help ensure that federal preparedness funds are directed to priority areas within individual jurisdictions.

Public Health
Emergency Preparedness 101

Public Health
Emergency Preparedness 102

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Public Health Preparedness Capabilities: National Standards for State and Local Planning - Originally posted on March 21, 2011, updated on July 22, 2011. See a summary of updates.

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Cover Page

Table of Contents (p. 1)

Executive Summary (p. 2-5)

Using this Document for Strategic Planning (p. 6-9)

At-A-Glance: Capability Definitions, Functions, and Associated Performance Measures (p. 10-15)

Capabilities (in alphabetical order)