Syndromic surveillance : made in Europe

The health of the population is threatened by various disease outbreaks, natural disasters or man-made threats. Rapid information is crucial to prevent spread of disease, target interventions and control rumours. However, current health information systems are too slow and focus on previously defined infectious diseases only. Ziemann found that analysing alternative, already existing, electronic information sources such as emergency care patient records or web searches provide supplementary, near real-time information on the public health impact of different infectious and non-infectious threats. Comparing experiences with such information sources across several European countries resulted in concrete recommendations to improve health information practice.