Molecular Biology Unit, Sirius Training and Research Centre, Khartoum, Sudan.
Sudan Field Epidemiology Training Program, Health Emergencies and Epidemics Control General Directorate, Sudan Federal Ministry of Health, Khartoum, Sudan.
Am J Trop Med Hyg. 2024 Aug 13;111(5):1093-1096. doi: 10.4269/ajtmh.23-0624. Print 2024 Nov 6.
Assessing the COVID-19 surveillance system is vital. It identifies cases swiftly and is crucial in curbing COVID-19 spread, especially among vulnerable groups. Public health surveillance collects, analyzes, and shares data systematically, informing actions to lessen disease impact. Here we used a mixed-approach method to assess the COVID-19 surveillance system in Sudan by reviewing the secondary data (line list) from January 28, 2020 to November 2, 2022. The system's effectiveness was rated weak based on the poor quality and incompleteness of the collected data, as well as the reporting process to policymakers and responders. Moreover, the system's acceptability score was low, mainly because of the incompleteness and delays in data reported from the private sector. This assessment recommends that the Federal Ministry of Health invest in improving the surveillance system by building the technical capacity of the staff, infrastructure, and utilization of the District Health Information Software-2 for data collection, analysis, and dissemination.
评估 COVID-19 监测系统至关重要。它能够快速识别病例，对于控制 COVID-19 的传播，特别是在弱势群体中，起着关键作用。公共卫生监测系统通过系统地收集、分析和共享数据，为减轻疾病影响提供决策依据。本研究采用混合方法，通过对 2020 年 1 月 28 日至 2022 年 11 月 2 日的二级数据（病例列表）进行审查，评估了苏丹的 COVID-19 监测系统。根据收集数据的质量差且不完整，以及向决策者和应对人员报告的过程，该系统的有效性被评为较弱。此外，系统的可接受性评分较低，主要是因为私营部门报告的数据不完整且存在延迟。该评估建议联邦卫生部投资改善监测系统，包括提高工作人员的技术能力、基础设施，并利用地区卫生信息软件-2 进行数据收集、分析和传播。
