Pandemic Origins: Technologies and Challenges for Biological Investigations

The GAO (Government Accountability Office) was asked to conduct a technology assessment on pandemic origins. GAO’s technology assessment sought to explore how emerging technologies, such as advanced genomics, could be used to better understand the origins of pandemics.

This report describes (1) Key technologies for pandemic origin investigations that are now available, (2) The advantages and disadvantages of these tools, as well as how scientists use them to determine the origins of pandemics, (3) There are cross-cutting challenges researchers face in trying to determine a pandemic’s origin.