International Circumpolar Surveillance
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Accomplishments & Activities
2004
- Northern Sweden joined ICS.
- A Steering Committee meeting was held in Atlanta, GA, on February 29, in conjunction with the International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases.
- The International Quality Control program for Streptococcus pneumoniae will be expanded to include Europe in November.
- An ICS Invasive Bacterial Disease Working Group meeting is planned for December 9 in Montreal, Quebec.
2003
- An ICS update was presented at the Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group meeting in Reykjavik, Iceland, in April.
- A working group meeting entitled "Strategies for increasing cooperation for the prevention and control of infectious diseases in circumpolar areas" was held in conjunction with the 12th International Congress on Circumpolar Health, in Nuuk, Greenland, September 10-13.
- ICS expansion to include Tb, HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis b explored.
- ICS was a topic presented at the 4th Conference on Combating Infectious
Diseases in the Barents Region of the Russian Federation held in Petrozavodsk,
Karelia, September 18-19, 2003.
- This meeting presented opportunities to meet with and discuss ICS with epidemiologists from the State Sanitary Epidemiology Centres from Murmansk, Karelia, Arkhangelsk, and St. Petersburg and was co-sponsored by the Norwegian Institute of Public Health as part of a Nordic Council of Ministers-funded Infectious Diseases Control Program in the Barents Sea regions of the Russian Federation.
2002
- A Steering Committee Meeting was held in Atlanta, GA, on March 25 in conjunction with the International Conference on Emerging Infectious Diseases. ICS progress and plans were reviewed. Additional steering committee members included representatives from Iceland and the Russian Federation.
- An Invasive Bacterial Disease Working Group meeting was held in Anchorage, Alaska, on May 9 in conjunction with the 3rd International Symposium on Pneumococci and Pneumococcal Diseases. Surveillance activities within each participating country were reviewed. The International Quality Control program for Streptococcus pneumoniae was reviewed, and plans to expand this program to include reference laboratories in northern Europe were discussed.
- An ICS update was presented at the Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group meeting in Oulu, Finland, on May 14. An ICS update was presented at the Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group meeting in Inari, Finland, on October 9. A written report on ICS progress and plans for 2003-2004 were provided to the Ministerial Meeting October 10.
- Presentations on ICS were made to public health officials from the State Sanitary Epidemiology and Surveillance Centres in Naryan Mar and Murmansk in November, 2002. This visit was arranged as part of the Norwegian Institute of Public Health's Nordic Council of Ministers-funded Infectious Diseases Control Program in the Barents Sea regions of the Russian Federation.
- In November, 2002, the Arctic Investigations Program hosted a delegation of hospital physicians and public health officials from Chukotka and presented an overview of infectious disease prevention and control activities in the US Arctic and the ICS program.
2001
- Iceland, Norway and Finland joined ICS.
- In Iceland, 10 district hospitals participated and forwarded invasive pneumococcal isolates to a reference laboratory in Reykjavik. Case reports are forwarded to AIP annually.
- In Norway, invasive pneumococcal isolates from 33 district hospitals are sent to reference laboratories in Oslo or Tromso for serotyping and susceptibility testing.
- In Finland, invasive pneumococcal isolates from 23 district hospitals are sent to reference laboratories in Oulu.
- A Steering Committee meeting was held in Copenhagen, Denmark, May 3-4 at the Danish Polar Center. The steering committee was established to guide and review ICS activities, as well as to identify, prioritize and initiate the development of new surveillance activities. While the current activities included infectious diseases of community concern, it was recognized that the model could also be used to monitor other human health priorities. Members included representatives from the US, Canada, Greenland, Norway, Finland, and the Indigenous Peoples Secretariat.
- An ICS update was presented at the Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group meeting in Rovaniemi, Finland, on April 4.
2000
- Greenland joined ICS.
- Pneumococcal isolates from patients with invasive disease were forwarded from 15 district hospitals in Greenland to reference laboratories in Nuuk, Greenland, and Copenhagen, Denmark for serotyping and susceptibility testing.
- An Invasive Bacterial Disease Working Group meeting was held in Toronto, Ontario, Canada on March 9. Reviewed invasive pneumococcal disease data collected from the US Arctic and northern Canada during the pilot study year (1999), and focused on problems encountered in regard to specimen handling, shipping data collection and analysis. It was decided to expand the pathogens under surveillance to include Haemophilus influenzae, Neisseria meningitidis, Groups A and B streptococcus.
- Establishment of an ICS steering committee was proposed. Members would be public health representatives from each participating countries and representative indigenous peoples organizations with interests in Arctic human health.
- A working group meeting entitled "International Circumpolar Surveillance of infectious diseases" was held in conjunction with the International Congress on Circumpolar Health in Harstad, Norway, June 4-11 2000.
- ICS was accepted as an Arctic Council Sustainable Development Working Group Project at the Arctic Council Ministerial meeting in Barrow, Alaska, October 10-13.
1999
- A pilot ICS project was established to conduct laboratory population based surveillance for invasive pneumococcal disease in the US Arctic and northern Canada. Isolates of Streptococcus pneumoniae recovered from patients with invasive disease (pneumonia, meningitis, or bacteremia) were collected from 23 clinical laboratories in the US Arctic (Alaska) and 14 clinical laboratories in northern Canada and were forwarded to reference laboratories in the US Arctic, and Alberta or Quebec respectively. The reference laboratories performed serotyping and antimicrobial susceptibility testing and established a Quality Control Program for Streptococcus pneumoniae. Identified cases were also reported to local public health personnel who review and provide clinical, demographic, and immunization history. Case and culture information was forwarded to the ICS coordinator at the Arctic Investigations Program for analysis, report generation and dissemination.
1998
- The ICS Working Group was established consisting of public health representatives
from the US Centers for Disease Control & Prevention, the Alaska Native
Health Tribal Consortium, the State of Alaska Division of Public Health,
Health Canada, Ministry of Health North West Territories, and the National
Center for Streptococcus, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. This meeting established
a list of diseases and conditions of concern to peoples living in Arctic
regions. These included invasive bacterial diseases, tuberculosis, respiratory
syncytial virus infections, hepatitis, sexually transmitted diseases, and
cancer.