Introducing Our New Journal: Infectious Microbes & Diseases

Prof. Lanjuan Li Editor-in-Chief

The 20th century has witnessed a steep decline of the global burden of infectious diseases due to improved hygiene conditions in large parts of the world and the introduction of vaccines and antimicrobials. However, in today's global landscape infectious diseases still remain a major concern. According to the 2017 Global Burden of Disease Study, communicable diseases still accounted for approximately 8.14 million deaths, which was 14.6% of all age deaths for that year.¹ Furthermore, it accounted for 24% of all age years of life lost. Infectious disease outbreaks have been rising since the 1980s² and pathogenic microbes are now spreading faster geographically due to international traveling. Simultaneously, emerging and re-emerging infectious diseases are being identified faster than ever before. The resurgence of these emerging and re-emerging diseases might be caused by climate change, changing international food chains, and a rise in antimicrobial resistance. According to a recent report on antimicrobial resistance issued by the UK government,³ unless proper action is taken, drug-resistant diseases might cause 10 million deaths per year by 2050, costing the global economy up to 100 trillion dollar. This is a daunting future scenario that we should be able to avert with joined global efforts and extensive surveillance, reporting and intensified fundamental and applied research on infectious microbes and diseases.

Over the past decades, China has transformed itself into an international powerhouse with an economic aggregate that has become the second-largest in the world. As a result, China's science and technology have entered a stage of great outbreak, and the growth rate of its scientific research has attracted worldwide attention. However, according to Web of Science, the number of English journals in China is only just over 300. Despite its rapid growth, the number of English journals still lags behind the overall scientific research output of China. Therefore, there is a serious imbalance between the scientific research level and the number of international journals in China. One of the fields that have shown rapid growth in China is in the field of infectious microbes and diseases. China has gradually moved to the forefront in our global efforts to combat infectious diseases. Of the 32 new infectious diseases discovered in the world over the past 20 years, about half have emerged in China. Furthermore, China has been at the center of efforts to contain pandemics of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome in 2003,⁴ H1N1 influenza in 2009⁵ and H7N9 influenza in 2013.⁶ Many of the Chinese scientists responsible for pushing the field teamed-up to jointly establish the Collaborative Innovation Centre for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases (CCID) in 2012. The CCID was housed at the State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases in China and has attracted a large number of domestic and foreign outstanding talents. Since its establishment, authors affiliated with CCID have published over 2500 high-quality international research papers, which are estimated to be approximately 1/25th of all high-level publications in the field of infectious diseases containing Chinese authors. Now, CCID decided to launch a new journal in the field of infectious microbes and diseases to help Chinese international publishing grow up to its potential.

The new journal “Infectious Microbes & Diseases” will take the open-access model, and will be co-published by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins and Zhejiang University Press on behalf of the CCID and the State Key Laboratory for Diagnosis and Treatment of Infectious Diseases in China. CCID hopes to run a world-class academic journal that promotes the timely and widespread dissemination of research on infectious microbes and diseases, improves the level of diagnosis, treatment, prevention, and control of infectious microbes and diseases, and safeguard human health. The research field of infectious microbes and diseases deserves an excellent platform based in China to publish and rapidly disseminate excellent research, and which is committed to solving the public health and safety problems caused by infectious microbes and diseases globally.