Communicable Diseases Surveillance

Communicable diseases surveillance highlights for May 2000 (vaccine preventable diseases, bloodborne diseases, gastrointestinal diseases, quarantinable diseases, sexually transmissible diseases, vectorborne diseases, other diseases), and surveillance outcomes from several reporting series as follows: National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System tables, 1 to 28 May 2000; Laboratory Serology and Virology Reporting Scheme tables, 1 to 31 May 2000; Australian Sentinel Practice Research Network report tables, 1 to 28 May 2000; HIV and AIDS surveillance, reporting period 1 to 31 January 2000, assessed as at 30 April 2000. In the March 2000 issue an additional summary table was introduced. Table 1 presents 'date of notification' data, which is a composite of three components: (i) the true onset date from a clinician, if available, (ii) the date the laboratory test was ordered, or (iii) the date reported to the public health unit. Table 2 presents data by report date for information only. In Table 2 the report date is the date the public health unit received the report. Table 1 now includes the following summary columns: total current month 2000 data; the totals for previous month 2000 and corresponding month 1999; a 5 year mean which is calculated using previous, corresponding and following month data for the previous 5 years (MMWR Weekly Feb 25, 2000:49(07);139-146); year to date (YTD) figures; the mean for the year to date figures for the previous 5 years; and the ratio of the current month to the mean of the last 5 years.