The AVMA supports the concept of a National Zoonotic Infectious Disease Surveillance System and urges continued efforts to develop the program. The System (described below) was adopted by the National Zoo and Veterinary Zoonotic Disease Infectious Disease Surveillance Meeting held August 13, 2002 in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Zoonotic diseases are among the most important emergent/resurgent infectious diseases facing public and animal health agencies at the beginning of the 21st century. The increased risk for the potential use of some of these pathogens for bioterrorist purposes underscores the importance for zoonotic agents of disease in both the public health and animal health communities. Effective surveillance will require collection and dissemination of large amounts of data in real time, and the collective efforts of multiple federal, state and private organizations.

Background
Zoonotic disease surveillance in the United States has, in the past, been fragmented, with little communication and information exchange between animal and public health agencies. The recent epidemic of West Nile virus (WNV) and the increased threat of bioterrorism using zoonotic pathogens have reinforced the need to develop a coordinated national surveillance system for these agents and the diseases they cause.

West Nile virus was identified for the first time in the Western Hemisphere in 1999. Anticipating rapid spread throughout the country, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), in collaboration with state health departments, developed a comprehensive National West Nile reporting system that collects, analyzes and reports back to health agencies and the public surveillance data from human, mosquitoes, birds, mammals and sentinel chicken flocks (ArboNet). This reporting system relies on individual member states or jurisdictions to upload data over a secure electronic network for inclusion. This is the first time that human, mosquito, avian and veterinary surveillance data have been coalesced into a single reporting system. The member states provide positive as well as negative data on a daily basis. Uploaded information is not made public until the member state verifies the data and releases the information for public viewing. Data are provided down to the county level. The ArboNet system allows health officials to follow the movement of the virus, identify hot spots, increase surveillance activities, educate the public and implement more effective prevention and control.

In June 2001, members from the zoo community, in conjunction with CDC and other agencies, met to discuss the addition of a zoo sentinel surveillance to the WNV surveillance system. The National West Nile virus Zoo Sentinel Surveillance Program, which uses many of the same features developed for the ArboNet system, was initiated in September 2001 as a pilot project. It allows zoos to act as sentinel sites, not only for WNV, but also for other zoonotic and foreign animal diseases. The program has been a tremendous success in providing important disease data while still protecting the confidentiality of the contributors.

The success of the Zoo Sentinel Surveillance system in maintaining confidentiality, and the progress made in real time electronic reporting demonstrated by the ArboNet system, suggest that we now have the tools to develop an interagency surveillance system for zoonotic diseases.

Objectives:

1. Expand the Zoo Sentinel Surveillance system to cover the entire United States, and to cover an expanded list of zoonotic disease agents.

2. To develop a national zoonotic disease surveillance system that provides early warning data to both the public health and animal health communities.

Methods/Approach:

A number of key organizations and government agencies will be involved in developing the national zoonotic disease surveillance system. It is, therefore, essential to organize another meeting that includes all of the potential stakeholders, to decide how this system will be developed and implemented.

Specific objectives for this meeting will be to:

1. Select four to five states where the system can be pilot tested
2. Identify laboratories that can be used to provide support for the system. Identify laboratory capacity needs.
3. Write protocols for laboratory testing, data collection, and dissemination.
4. Select an electronic data collection system that provides security and real time data dissemination.
5. Identify a lead agency to oversee the system and to coordinate a surveillance council made up of representatives of participating organizations/programs.
6. Select high priority disease agents that will be monitored in this surveillance system.