Variations within the human genome can be studied to determine susceptibility to infectious diseases. The study of variations within microbial genomes will also need to be evaluated to use genomics of infectious disease within public health. The ability to determine if a person has greater susceptibility to an infectious disease will be valuable to determine how to treat the disease if it is present or prevent the person from getting the disease. Several infectious diseases have shown a link between genetics and susceptibility in that families tend to have heritability traits of a disease.