Laboratory Surveillance System(2009)

Laboratory Surveillance System(2009)

As the outbreak of enterovirus epidemic in Taiwan in 1998 revealed the inadequacy of Taiwan in laboratory testing of viral infections in terms of both quality and quantity, the Department of Health (DOH) has partnered with contracted laboratories throughout this country for viral infection testings since March, 1999. The DOH not only financed these laboratories, but also managed to improve testing capability and laboratory staff training. The contracted laboratories and specimen-collecting stations form an active detection system, providing good quality laboratory diagnosis service. Such laboratory testing thus can be conducted at central and local levels that improve disease detection rate and time efficiency. This system is mainly responsible for the surveillance of epidemic strains, antigenicity, and drug resistance of enterovirus and influenza virus. For example, it double-checks whether the epidemic viral strains are in line with the strains of immunization, assesses major the activity of viral strains in different seasons, provides references for making epidemic prevention policy, and establishes important local viral genome database and biomaterial database.