1 What is surveillance?

Public health surveillance is defined as ‘ongoing, systematic collection, analysis, and interpretation of health-related data essential to planning, implementation, and evaluation of public health practice, closely integrated with the timely dissemination of these data to those responsible for prevention and control and relevant public health stakeholders to inform action’ (WHO, 2021).

‘Public health surveillance dates back to […] 3180 B.C. in Egypt. Hippocrates (460 B.C.-370 B.C.) coined the terms endemic and epidemic, John Graunt (1620-1674) introduced systematic data analysis, Samuel Pepys (1633-1703) started epidemic field investigation, William Farr (1807-1883) founded the modern concept of surveillance, John Snow (1813-1858) linked data to intervention, and Alexander Langmuir (1910-1993) gave the first comprehensive definition of surveillance.’

(Choi et al., 2012)

Activity 2: Reflecting on surveillance

Timing: Allow about 15 minutes
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Introduction

1.1 What is the difference between surveillance and research?