Developing an Online Infectious Disease Outbreak Database: Codifying the World Health Organization’s Disease Outbreak News reports
Background: The World Health Organization’s Disease Outbreak News (DONs) reports are the world’s primary source of official information on global disease outbreaks. Access to this information is crucial for informing research analyses, global health priorities, and decision making. However, in its current form, the utility of the DONs reports for research and analysis is limited as a result of their reporting format. To this end, we designed a standardized methodology for codifying the data contained in DONs reports and created an online, searchable database.
Methods: We coded DONs reports published between the years 1996 and 2019, systematically collecting data from each individual report using a standardized methodology and tabulating data into a single spreadsheet. We created a Year-Pathogen-Country taxonomy to group related disease events and circumvent issues related to reporting inconsistencies in DONs reports.
Results: In total, we reviewed 2,806 DONs reports corresponding to 1,105 unique infectious disease outbreaks from 1996-2019. Overall, H5N1 represented the most frequently reported disease, while China was the country with the most reports. We observed the DONs reports to contain numerous issues relating to the standardization, accuracy, and transparency of reporting procedures.
Conclusions: Our database represents a new, accessible resource for research that improves the accessibility of the data contained in DONs reports. The World Health Organization should consider standardizing reporting practices, protocols, and procedures as a means of improving the reporting and transparency of infectious disease outbreaks.
Trial Registration: N/A
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Posted 15 Jun, 2020
On 13 Jan, 2021
Received 03 Jan, 2021
On 22 Dec, 2020
Received 16 Dec, 2020
Received 26 Nov, 2020
On 24 Nov, 2020
On 22 Nov, 2020
Invitations sent on 09 Oct, 2020
On 16 Jun, 2020
On 12 Jun, 2020
On 09 Jun, 2020
On 03 Jun, 2020
Developing an Online Infectious Disease Outbreak Database: Codifying the World Health Organization’s Disease Outbreak News reports
Posted 15 Jun, 2020
On 13 Jan, 2021
Received 03 Jan, 2021
On 22 Dec, 2020
Received 16 Dec, 2020
Received 26 Nov, 2020
On 24 Nov, 2020
On 22 Nov, 2020
Invitations sent on 09 Oct, 2020
On 16 Jun, 2020
On 12 Jun, 2020
On 09 Jun, 2020
On 03 Jun, 2020
Background: The World Health Organization’s Disease Outbreak News (DONs) reports are the world’s primary source of official information on global disease outbreaks. Access to this information is crucial for informing research analyses, global health priorities, and decision making. However, in its current form, the utility of the DONs reports for research and analysis is limited as a result of their reporting format. To this end, we designed a standardized methodology for codifying the data contained in DONs reports and created an online, searchable database.
Methods: We coded DONs reports published between the years 1996 and 2019, systematically collecting data from each individual report using a standardized methodology and tabulating data into a single spreadsheet. We created a Year-Pathogen-Country taxonomy to group related disease events and circumvent issues related to reporting inconsistencies in DONs reports.
Results: In total, we reviewed 2,806 DONs reports corresponding to 1,105 unique infectious disease outbreaks from 1996-2019. Overall, H5N1 represented the most frequently reported disease, while China was the country with the most reports. We observed the DONs reports to contain numerous issues relating to the standardization, accuracy, and transparency of reporting procedures.
Conclusions: Our database represents a new, accessible resource for research that improves the accessibility of the data contained in DONs reports. The World Health Organization should consider standardizing reporting practices, protocols, and procedures as a means of improving the reporting and transparency of infectious disease outbreaks.
Trial Registration: N/A
Figure 1
Figure 2
Figure 3
Figure 4