El concepto de la vigilancia epidemiológica de las enfermedades transmisibles

Abstract

Although science and technology have provided means for the efficient control and prevention of most of the communicable diseases in the world, recent developments can only be partially implemented and consequently discrepancies in the health field between well-developed and developing countries are steadily increasing. Moreover, it is interesting to find that several easily preventable infectious diseases still have a high incidence in well-developed countries with all the necessary means and resources to control them

Surveillance means the epidemiological study of a disease as a dynamic process involving the ecology of the infectious agent, the host, the reservoirs, the vectors and the environment, as well as the complex mechanisms concerned in the spread of infection and the extent to which this spread occurs. It facilitates the recognition and analysis of the problem and is fundamental to the planning, implementation and evaluation of communicable disease control measures. The use of surveillance methodology helps to bring to light the reasons for the failure of a vaccination program which may be due, among other reasons, to: inadequate implementation of the program, defective composition of the vaccine, defective techniques used, different ecological situations or a combination of any of these factors

The prerequisite for the successful surveillance of communicable diseases is a close ...(AU)