The importance of surveillance in cases and mortality from COVID-19 epidemic in Belo Horizonte, 2020

• Autor(a) principal: Corrêa, Paulo Roberto Lopes
• Data de Publicação: 2020
• Outros Autores: Ishitani, Lenice Harumi, Abreu, Daisy Maria Xavier de, Teixeira, Renato Azeredo, Marinho, Fatima, França, Elisabeth Barboza
• Tipo de documento: preprint
• Idioma: por
• Título da fonte: SciELO Preprints
• Texto Completo: https://preprints.scielo.org/index.php/scielo/preprint/view/741
• topic: COVID-19; Vigilância epidemiológica; Avaliação de serviços; Epidemia; COVID-19; Epidemiological monitoring; Evaluation of services; Epidemic

Objectives: This study aims to describe the actions carried out by the epidemiological surveillance system in Belo Horizonte to address the COVID-19 epidemic and the timeless of the data for detecting transmission in 2020. Methods: The sources of information used by the epidemiological surveillance of the municipality for COVID-19 were identified and the temporal distribution and interval for detection of confirmed cases of the disease were analyzed. Results: The city's epidemiological surveillance uses outpatient, hospital, public and private laboratory notifications as data sources. For reporting COVID-19 cases in official information systems, there is also an active search of laboratory results linked to suspected deaths investigated. From January to April 2020, 1,449 hospitalized cases of COVID-19 were reported, the first case being detected in late February 2020. Of the total 1,025 laboratory samples of cases hospitalized after the 8th epidemiological week, 87 (8.5%) of COVID-19 cases were confirmed. The median time between the onset of symptoms and the release of laboratory results was 12 days for the analyzed period. Conclusion: Epidemiological surveillance uses several data sources to monitor and analyze the transmission of COVID-19. The timeliness of this system to detect cases of the disease is compromised by the delay in the release of laboratory results, which has been a considerable challenge for adequate surveillance.