The value of ProMED-mail for the Early Warning Committee in the Netherlands: more specific approach recommended.

Full Abstract

This article describes a retrospective and descriptive study into the added value of ProMED-mail--the global electronic reporting system for outbreaks of emerging infectious diseases and toxins maintained by the International Society for Infectious Diseases--as an early warning system for The Netherlands Early Warning Committee (NEWC). Information about infectious disease events in foreign countries originating from ProMED-mail was retrieved from the reports of the NEWC between May 2006 and June 2007. Each event was analysed in depth in order to determine if it could have been a possible threat to public health in The Netherlands. It was determined whether these events were mentioned in other sources of information used by the NEWC besides ProMED-mail. In addition, we assessed the possible consequences of missing an event when not reading ProMED-mail or of being informed of the event with a time delay. Semi-structured interviews with stakeholders were conducted to explore other functions of ProMED-mail besides early warning. Five out of 25 events reported in ProMED-mail were assessed as a potential threat to The Netherlands, mainly because of the known vulnerability of The Netherlands for vaccine preventable diseases:
an outbreak of measles in the United Kingdom and Japan, a case of poliomyelitis in Kenya, and two events concerning Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) H5N1. The outbreak of measles in Japan and one case of HPAI H5N1 infection in a bird in Germany were only reported by ProMED-mail; the other potential threats were mentioned in other sources with a time delay. ProMED-mail has a limited but real added value over other sources in the early warning of threats. A more specific approach of using ProMED-mail by defining vulnerabilities of a country would be useful and efficient. ProMED-mail is appreciated for providing background and preliminary outbreak information.

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Author information

Author/s: Zeldenrust, M E (ME); Rahamat-Langendoen, J C (JC); Postma, M J (MJ); van Vliet, J A (JA);

Affiliation: University of Groningen, Groningen, The Netherlands.

Journal and publication information

Publication Type: Journal Article

Journal: Euro surveillance : bulletin européen sur les maladies transmissibles = European communicable disease bulletin (Euro Surveill), published in Sweden. (Language: eng)

Reference: 2008-Feb; vol 13 (issue 6) : pp

Dates: Created 2008/04/30; Completed 2008/05/28;

PMID: 18445424, status: MEDLINE (last retrieval date: 11/6/2008)

Sourced from the National Library of Medicine. Abstract text and other information may be subject to copyright.

Comments and Corrections

CommentIn: Euro Surveill. 2008 Feb 7;13(6). pii: 8030. (PMID: 18445427)

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MeSH headings (categories)

This article was linked to the MESH Headings shown below.

Disease Notification - methods
Disease Outbreaks - prevention & control; statistics & numerical data
Electronic Mail
Humans
International Cooperation

International Cooperation
Internet
Netherlands - epidemiology
Population Surveillance - methods
Registries

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