In the context of bioterrorism, what does mitigation focus on?

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Mitigation in bioterrorism focuses on reducing risk by preventing an attack or lessening its consequences. This means putting measures in place to lower the probability that an attack will succeed and to minimize impact if one occurs—such as strengthening biosurveillance and early detection, securing critical infrastructure and supply chains, controlling access to dangerous agents, vaccination and prophylaxis where applicable, and rapid information sharing across sectors. This emphasis on prevention and risk reduction distinguishes mitigation from activities like improving response time (which belongs to preparedness and response), which is about what happens after a threat is detected. Expanding attack options would run counter to mitigation, and ignoring threats is simply not mitigation.