In September, the chapter had a chance to hear from Jim Seligman, chief information office for the Center for Disease Control (CDC), which is headquartered in Atlanta. Seligman oversees the agency's Information Technology Services Office, serving as the leader of the agency's overall information technology program. He spoke to a sold-out crowd.
The CDC concerns itself with emerging urgent threats (potential biological attacks, the H1NI flu virus, etc.) and the reality of day-to-day epidemics, global health, combating acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS) and other threats to the U.S. government and its people. Seligman constantly works to manage the growing mountain of data and its dissemination.
He announced the award of the CDC Information Management Services (CIMS) Contract to 30 contractors. The award announcement came on September 23. CIMS is a departure from the CDC's normal acquisition strategy. Rather than awarding one contract for one task, they now have a cadre of 30 contractors to provide a range of solutions and pricing for individual tasks that may arise over the next 10-year period. The indefinite delivery/indefinite quantity task order contract ceiling is worth an estimated $5 billion, which breaks down into categories: information management, $3 billion; information technology (IT) infrastructure, $1 billion; and management consulting, $1 billion.
The CDC not only monitors U.S. and global health, but it also is a premier agency for conducting health research, developing public health policies, promoting healthy behavior and fostering safe environments. The total budget of the CDC in 2010 was $11 billion. However, the information technology budget hovers around $430 million. This supports more than 16,000 CDC staff members around the globe and their IT requirements. The CDC has its eye on its own set of IT trends, including: health care reform; health IT; electronic health records; health information exchange; transparency and openness; international awareness; global expansion; high-performance infrastructure; security; teleworking; hoteling; green IT; cloud computing; and data center consolidation. |
