Abstract
Africa has the highest burden of infectious diseases in the world and yet the least capacity for its risk management. It has therefore become increasingly important to search for 'fit-for- purpose' approaches to infectious disease surveillance and thereby targeted disease control. The fact that the majority of human infectious diseases are originally of animal origin means we have to consider One Health (OH) approaches which require inter-sectoral collaboration for custom-made infectious disease surveillance in the endemic settings of Africa. A baseline survey was conducted to assess the current status and performance of human and animal health surveillance systems and subsequently a strategy towards OH surveillance system was developed. The strategy focused on assessing the combination of participatory epidemiological approaches and the deployment of mobile technologies to enhance the effectiveness of disease alerts and surveillance at the point of occurrence, which often lies in remote areas. We selected three study sites, namely the Ngorongoro, Kagera River basin and Zambezi River basin ecosystems. We have piloted and introduced the next-generation Android mobile phones running the EpiCollect application developed by Imperial College to aid geo-spatial and clinical data capture and transmission of this data from the field to the remote Information Technology (IT) servers at the research hubs for storage, analysis, feedback and reporting. We expect that the combination of participatory epidemiology and technology will significantly improve OH disease surveillance in southern Africa.
Highlights
There have been some recent advances in the diagnosis and management of human infectious diseases, they still are a significant impact and burden on global economies and public health (Jones et al 2008)
Most of these are as a result of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs), defined as infections that have newly appeared in a population or have existed but are rapidly increasing in incidence or geographic range (Morse 1995)
The central coordinating level for disease surveillance and response is at the district level (DVO and District Medical Office (DMO))
Summary
There have been some recent advances in the diagnosis and management of human infectious diseases, they still are a significant impact and burden on global economies and public health (Jones et al 2008). Infectious diseases are responsible for a quarter of all human deaths worldwide (King et al 2006). Most of these are as a result of emerging infectious diseases (EIDs), defined as infections that have newly appeared in a population or have existed but are rapidly increasing in incidence or geographic range (Morse 1995). Analysis of origins of EIDs for longer than six decades concluded that over 60% are zoonotic of which about 72% originate in wild animals (Jones et al 1978). It has been observed that when considering spatial distribution of origins of infectious diseases, the majority are prevalent in and affect developing countries in the tropics, in Africa and South-East Asia
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