APHIS, CBP, CDC, and FWS share responsibility for preventing the importation of live animals that may introduce and spread zoonotic and animal diseases. APHIS, CDC, and FWS have developed regulations that provide specific requirements and restrictions on the importation of animals. In some cases, more than one agency may regulate a given animal. For example, CDC regulates dogs for their risk of spreading rabies to humans, and APHIS regulates dogs from countries with screwworm, a parasite that can cause great damage to domestic livestock and other warm-blooded animals, for their risk of spreading this parasite to agricultural animals. Information on each agency’s responsibilities and oversight activities follows and is presented in greater detail in appendix II. While CBP is responsible for overseeing all imports and assists other agencies in enforcing their import regulations, APHIS, CDC, and FWS have specific statutory and regulatory responsibilities for protecting human, domesticated animal, and wildlife health from risks posed by live animal imports. APHIS. APHIS restricts the importation of live animals that it has determined may pose a disease risk to agricultural animals, such as cattle, horses, poultry, sheep, and swine. APHIS requires that many of the animals it regulates be visually inspected at the port of entry and generally requires the animals be accompanied by health certificates signed by a licensed veterinarian in the country of export and import permits. APHIS determines the level of inspection for animals on the basis of their associated disease risk, for both the type of animal and country of export. As a result of this determination, APHIS may restrict imports of certain animals from certain countries or require that animals undergo quarantine and disease testing. APHIS veterinarians inspect live animal imports at 15 land ports along the border with Mexico, 20 land ports along the border with Canada, and 30 airports across the continental United States, and in Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico. In addition, APHIS maintains animal quarantine facilities in southern California, southern Florida, and New York state and oversees private quarantine facilities for birds and horses in southern California. At these quarantine facilities, imported animals are held until test results for various diseases are received. CBP. CBP assists other federal agencies in enforcing their import regulations, has the primary authority to inspect imports, and seeks to interdict shipments of contraband and the illegal importation of live animals and other products while facilitating the flow of legal travel and trade. According to CBP officials, when a live animal shipment arrives at a port of entry, CBP holds and refers the shipment to the responsible agency or agencies. CBP holds the import until an agency representative is available to release it. After the responsible regulating agency has released the import, CBP clears the import for entry into the United States. CBP staff are present at more than 300 land, air, and sea ports of entry and are trained in the procedures to follow when live animals are presented for customs clearance. CDC. CDC restricts the importation of live animals that it has determined pose a risk to public health. CDC’s restrictions on these imports vary by type of animal and can include banning certain imports, requiring permits, requiring vaccination certificates, and requiring quarantine. CDC staff are not present at all ports of entry to routinely inspect live animal imports. According to CDC officials, CDC relies on APHIS, CBP, and FWS staff to enforce its regulations at ports of entry. When the agencies’ staff have questions about enforcing CDC’s regulations, they are to contact CDC quarantine public health officers, who are often located at a CDC quarantine station that is at or near the port of entry. CDC has 20 quarantine stations in the continental United States, Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico. FWS. FWS restricts the importation of certain wildlife. Specifically, FWS restricts the importation of injurious wildlife and threatened or endangered species and related species for which international trade is regulated under international agreements. Injurious wildlife includes animals that are individually listed in the Lacey Act or prescribed in FWS regulations to be injurious to human beings; to the interests of agriculture, horticulture, or forestry; or to wildlife or the wildlife resources of the United States. FWS seeks to prevent the introduction of invasive species as injurious wildlife under the Lacey Act. Invasive species are alien (or nonnative) species whose introduction does, or is likely to, cause economic or environmental harm or harm to human health. At ports of entry, FWS wildlife inspectors review the required import documents and, for some live animal shipments, perform visual inspections. If FWS determines that the animals are prohibited from importation based on FWS regulations, for example, are injurious to wildlife or threatened or endangered species, it rejects the import unless it has an FWS permit, which may be issued under certain conditions, such as educational purposes. FWS has about 120 wildlife inspectors who handle shipments at 49 ports of entry nationwide, including 7 land ports along the Mexican border, 24 land ports along the Canadian border, and 18 designated ports for air, ocean, rail, and truck across the continental United States and in Alaska and Hawaii. APHIS and FWS data systems provide information on the number of and purpose for live animal imports, as well as on the country from which the import has been shipped into the United States in recent years. According to the APHIS data system, about 32 million live animals—mostly agricultural or aquacultural—were imported under APHIS regulation in fiscal year 2008, the most recent year for which verified data were available. They included cattle, fish, poultry, and swine. According to the FWS data system, about 177 million live animals—all wildlife—were imported under FWS regulation in fiscal year 2009. About 157 million of these imports were fish. Other types of animals imported under FWS regulation included amphibians, birds, corals, crustaceans, insects, mammals, mollusks, and reptiles. More information about the number and type of live animal imports is in appendix III. In 2000, we reported that agencies face a range of barriers when they attempt to collaborate with other agencies. With these barriers in place, federal agencies carry out programs in a fragmented, uncoordinated way, resulting in a patchwork of programs that can waste scarce funds, confuse and frustrate program customers, and limit the overall effectiveness of the federal effort. Subsequently, in 2005, we identified key practices that can help enhance and sustain collaboration among federal agencies. Among the practices we identified were (1) defining and articulating a common outcome; (2) defining and agreeing on roles and responsibilities; (3) establishing mutually reinforcing or joint strategies; (4) identifying and addressing needs by leveraging resources; and (5) establishing compatible policies, procedures, and other means to operate across agency boundaries. In our 2005 report, we stated that while we generally believe that the application of as many of these practices as possible increases the likelihood of effective collaboration, we also recognize that there is a wide range of situations and circumstances in which agencies work together. Recognizing that zoonotic and animal diseases are interconnected, several organizations—including the American Medical Association, the American Veterinary Medical Association, and CDC—have taken steps to support the One Health concept, which is a worldwide strategy for expanding interdisciplinary collaboration and communications in all aspects of health care for humans and animals. In 2007, the American Veterinary Medical Association established the One Health Initiative Task Force to study the feasibility of a campaign to facilitate collaboration and cooperation among health science professions, academic institutions, governmental agencies, and industries to help, among other things, assess, treat, and prevent cross-species disease transmission. In 2008, the task force framed the issue, stating that the convergence of people, animals, and the environment has created a new dynamic in which the health of each group is inextricably interconnected. Examples of recent diseases causing animal, human, environmental, or economic harm are described in appendix IV. In 1999, an executive order established the National Invasive Species Council, cochaired by the Secretaries of Agriculture, Commerce, and the Interior. Its members are the Secretaries and Administrators of 13 federal departments and agencies. The council was charged with providing national leadership; seeing that the federal invasive species activities are coordinated, complementary, cost-efficient, and effective; and encouraging planning and action at local, tribal, state, and regional levels. The range of invasive species issues that the council is attempting to address includes live animal imports that may bring diseases into the United States. The executive order also required the Secretary of the Interior to establish the Invasive Species Advisory Committee, a group of 30 nonfederal stakeholders from diverse constituencies (representing state, tribal, local, and private concerns) around the nation, to advise the council on invasive species issues. In 2008, the council issued its most recent management plan for invasive species, the 2008-2012 National Invasive Species Management Plan. The management plan lists goals and performance elements that identify the federal agency with the lead or participant role. It includes tasks pertaining to pathogens or diseases. For example, one of the tasks is to develop a process for identifying high- priority invasive plants, animals, and plant or animal pathogens for agencies’ actions. The council is currently preparing a progress report on the implementation of the 2008-through-2012 plan, with an expected completion date of October 2010. Studies by the National Academies of Sciences and others have found significant deficiencies in the regulation of live animal imports that may allow the introduction and spread of emerging zoonotic and animal diseases. For example, A 2005 National Academies of Sciences report referred to a “patchwork of federal policies and agencies with limited or ill-defined jurisdiction” for the importation of wildlife, “a significant gap in preventing and rapidly detecting emergent diseases,” and “a lack of coordinated federal oversight” over disease issues associated with these animals.