"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has awarded more than $200 million through the Epidemiology and Laboratory Capacity for Infectious Diseases (ELC) cooperative agreement to help states, cities, counties, and territories prevent, detect, respond to, and control the growing threats posed by emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases," the release stated.
The release said that the programs run by the US states are integral to the national effort to fight infectious disease threats due to local surveillance and outbreak response capabilities.
Approximately $77 million of the money will be used to fight local antibiotic resistance threats, because more than 23,000 people in the United States each year die from infections that are resistant to antibiotics, the release also said.