Revasia

CIRAD and Kasetsart University co-organised an international seminar on “Innovative Tools for Analysis of Animal Health Surveillance Systems” on the 16-17 December 2010 in Kasetsart University, Bangkok.

The objectives of the seminar were 1) to review the current epidemiological situation of HPAI H5N1 in South East Asia (SEA); 2) to present the networks in place for HPAI surveillance in the region and 3) to discuss about existing and innovative tools for the evaluation of the surveillance networks.

Evaluation of surveillance systems is a critical part of surveillance to ensure quality and representativeness of the data generated. Knowledge and understanding of the disease epidemiology is limited because of bias from the surveillance system. Those biases could be accounted for if the sensitivity and predictive value of the surveillance systems was quantified. A better understanding of the weaknesses of the system will help to identify the gaps for cost-effective improvement in the quality of data generated. The performance of systems must be quantified in order to improve them and adjust resources (actors, budgets, structures) to the needs of each country (detection of disease emergence, monitoring the effectiveness of control measures such as vaccination).  Standard evaluation methods are generally qualitative or semi-quantitative and are often subjective. Research is ongoing to develop quantitative tools for the evaluation of surveillance systems in both animal and human health using methods such as Capture-Recapture; probabilistic approaches (scenario trees) and mathematical modeling/simulation.

Programme, Participant list and Presentations

Session 2: Influenza surveillance systems in South East Asia

Session 3: Ongoing research on the evaluation of surveillance systems in SEA

Session 4: Expert Opinion

Session 5: Capture-Recapture (C-R)

Session 6: Session 6: Stochastic Scenario Trees

Session 7: Socio‐economic issues

Session 8: Modeling / Simulation approaches