We don’t have quiet, slow years at ASPR. We have years that require us to move quickly, to innovate often, and to get the most out of our teams and resources. 2023 was no exception. Looking back, I want us to remember the great work we did on behalf of the American people as we helped our country prepare for, respond to, and recover from public health emergencies and disasters. In 2023, great work happened throughout ASPR, here are some highlights:

Preparedness:

ASPR’s Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority (BARDA) launched Project NextGen, with an initial investment of $5 billion, to improve access and enable faster, lower cost, rapid, and flexible production of vaccines and therapeutics.

The ASPR Office of Preparedness funded the Medical Reserve Corps with $50 million in awards to 33 states and jurisdictions to strengthen their network – focusing on emergency preparedness, response, and health equity needs. We helped partners better understand their risks and increase their preparedness by developing the enhanced RISC Toolkit 2.0.

The H-CORE and Industrial Base Management and Supply Chain (IBMSC) office coordinated the distribution of over 100 million free tests this year alone. Free tests are still available at COVIDTests.gov. We also invested $600 million across 12 domestic COVID-19 test manufacturers to improve preparedness for COVID-19 and other future pandemic threats and reduce our reliance on overseas manufacturing.

Response and Recovery:

The ASPR Office of Response deployed highly trained personnel as part of combined federal, territorial, and state response missions to ease the burden on local health systems for numerous natural disasters, including Guam for Typhoon Mawar; Hawaii for the devastating wildfires in Maui; Florida for Hurricane Idalia; and Maine due to the tragic mass shooting in Lewiston. Our response to the Maui Wildfires was the most significant and extended disaster behavioral health mission in the last decade.

And the Strategic National Stockpile distributed more than 50,000 courses of Tamiflu to respond to flu outbreaks and over 1 million mpox countermeasures while continuing to stockpile personal protective equipment (PPE) and other countermeasures.

Additional highlights from 2023:

• ASPR’s TACMed team was awarded the Congressional Gold Medal for their medical response to the January 6 attack on the US Capitol.
• ASPR’s Hospital Preparedness Program invested $240 million to better prepare hospitals across the country for disasters, emergencies, and new and emerging pathogens.
• Teams from our National Disaster Medical System, and other deployments responded to eight National Special Security Events.
• Our Critical Infrastructure Protection Division tracked 285 cyber incidents in the healthcare and public health sectors and released a cybersecurity implementation guide to help the public and private health care sectors prevent cybersecurity incidents.
• BARDA received its 85th FDA approval for a medical countermeasure.
• Our team in the Office of Administration continued to build the infrastructure needed to support our new Operating Division, including, establishing our own hiring function.

Last year was a big year for ASPR. We met our mission and emerged better and stronger. We will use our experiences in 2023 to inform our future response and recovery actions while preparing for whatever comes next.