Laboratory Surveillance System(2008)

Laboratory Surveillance System(2008)

The outbreak of enterovirus epidemic situation in Taiwan in 1998 exposed the deficiency in the quality and quantity of virus laboratories in Taiwan. Therefore, the Department of Health has founded contracted laboratories for viral infections in the whole Taiwan successively since March of 1999, besides providing subsidies for the laboratories, and it put more efforts into the improvement of ability in virus inspection and the cultivation of talents. At present, the contracted laboratories are playing an important role in the prevention of viral infections in all districts of Taiwan, moreover, the initiative surveillance system of enterovirus and influenza laboratory formed by the contracted laboratories and their peripheral examination sites provides good laboratory diagnosis services timely, besides carrying out central and local inspection grading systems, improving the detection rate of diseases and the timeliness, taking strict precautions against the diffusion of infectious diseases, and accelerating the control on epidemic situations, it enables us to know the activities of important viruses in different areas of Taiwan in different seasons, that can be used as important references for early warning of infectious diseases and epidemic prevention policies, even a precious native genetic and biomaterial databases of viruses have been set up for Taiwan.