i
Technical guidelines for United States--Mexico coordination on public health events of mutual interest
-
May 2012
[PDF-354.62 KB]
Details:
-
Corporate Authors:U.S.-Mexico Binational Council. Core Group on Epidemiologic Surveillance of the Health Working Group. ; Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (U.S.) ; Mexico. Dirección General de Epidemiología. ; Mexico. Secretaría de Salud. ; National Center for Zoonotic and Emerging Infectious Diseases (U.S.). Division of Global Migration and Quarantine.
-
Description:In 2002, within the framework of the United States-Mexico Binational Commission, representatives from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and Mexico’s Secretaria de Salud established a binational group on Epidemiologic Surveillance and Information Exchange to address issues of interest to both countries. With the objective of better defining how the two countries should collaborate on epidemiologic events of mutual interest, the present document has been elaborated by federal and state public health officials from both countries to provide a set of shared guidelines. The United States and Mexico have a rich tradition of collaboration on epidemiologic events involving the two countries, including infectious disease outbreaks, diseases associated with products from the other country, and the continuity of care for patients with tuberculosis and other key diseases, traveling between the two countries. A joint Border Infectious Disease Surveillance project has been in place since 1999, and an Early Warning Infectious Disease Program was initiated in 2004. In addition, the TB Cross-border Management and Referral Project facilitates healthcare provider access to information on TB patients traveling between the two countries to ensure continuity of therapy. The Laboratory Response Network, providing diagnostic support for select pathogens, includes public health laboratories from both Mexico and the United States as members. Facilitated by the close ties resulting from these and other collaborations, public health professionals from the two countries have regularly sought to keep their counterparts apprised of relevant epidemiologic events. However, clear guidelines have not yet been formally adopted for what information should be shared and how the sharing should take place. Public health officials from the two countries chose to formulate such a set of guidelines with the objectives of better institutionalizing the exchange of information on epidemiologic events of mutual interest, and promoting collaborative responses when appropriate. Recognizing that productive collaboration already occurs between many 'sister cities' along the United States-Mexico border and between neighboring states, it should be emphasized that the present Technical Guidelines for United States-Mexico Coordination on Public Health Events of Mutual Interest (Guidelines) should facilitate the continuation of existing binational cooperation, while at the same time fostering more systematic and comprehensive sharing of information at all levels of government. These Guidelines focus primarily on coordination between the public health agencies/units that have primary responsibility for epidemiologic surveillance. They do not seek to define coordination between agencies/units with major regulatory functions, for which arrangements have already been established.
These Guidelines were developed by the Core Group on Epidemiologic Surveillance of the Health Working Group, U.S.-Mexico Binational Commission and subsequently refined by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and by the General Directorate of Epidemiology (DGE), Secretaria de Salud (SSA), Mexico.
OADS201224
-
Subjects:
-
Document Type:
-
Genre:
-
Place as Subject:
-
Collection(s):
-
Main Document Checksum:
-
Download URL:
-
File Type:
