Surveillance for public health emergencies caused by infectious diarrhea other than cholera, dysentery, typhoid and paratyphoid in China, 2014–2016

Objective To understand the epidemiological characteristics of the public health emergencies caused by infectious diarrhea other than cholera, dysentery, typhoid and paratyphoid (hereinafter referred to as other infectious diarrheal diseases) in China.

Methods Descriptive epidemiologic analysis was conducted by using the incidence data of other infectious diarrheal diseases in China from 2014 to 2016, which were collected from National Public Health Emergency Report Management Information System. The spatial auto-correlation analysis (Moran’s I and Getis G) were conducted for spatial statistical analyses on the incidences of other infectious diarrhea.

Results A total of 332 other infectious diarrhea epidemics were reported in China from 2014 to 2016, involving 17 130 cases and without death. The annual incidence of other infectious diarrheal epidemic was high during November-March. Norovirus infection epidemic accounted for 86.14%. The causes of these incidents included exposure in daily life and food or drinking water contamination. All the provinces reporting the epidemics were in eastern China. Spatial autocorrelation analysis showed that the spatial clustering of other infectious diarrhea epidemics in China was obvious, and the " hot spots” were mainly in Guangdong, Guangxi and Fujian provinces.

ConclusionNorovirus infection was the main cause of other infectious diarrhea epidemics in China. It is necessary to strengthen the health education in key population and surveillance in key places, such as schools, and improve food and drinking water safety supervision and management for the effective prevention and control of other infectious diarrheal diseases. In addition, it is suggested to strengthen the prevention and control in provinces where the " hot spots” clustered, such as Guangdong, Guangxi and Fujian, further explore the causes and mechanisms of obvious disease clustering and take effective prevention and control measures to reduce the incidence of other infectious diarrheal diseases.