China to set up a comprehensive system for infectious diseases

China plans to complete building a multipoint and efficient surveillance and early warning system for infectious diseases, as well as improving the nation's capability in detecting early signs of an epidemic and sending prompt warnings to a world-leading level by 2030, according to a guideline released on Friday.

The sensitivity and accuracy of the nation's surveillance network for novel contagious diseases, illnesses of unknown cause and key infectious diseases should also be improved significantly, it added.

The document was released by the National Disease Control and Prevention Administration and eight other government departments.

To achieve these goals, the document proposed a series of detailed measures, including connecting all grassroots medical institutions and private hospitals with the nation's infectious disease direct reporting system and strengthening monitoring of fever clinic visits and the number of severe cases and mortalities related to key infectious diseases.

More efforts will also be made to establish a comprehensive laboratory network to test and monitor spread of pathogenic microorganisms, coordinate surveillance of different government departments and make use of information from the public and media reports.

The document also stresses improving laboratory testing capabilities.

Gradually, all provincial-level disease control centers should be equipped with a research lab on infectious diseases of biosafety level III — the second-highest level in a four-tier system. Municipal-level disease control facilities should be equipped with a lab of biosafety level II.

Meanwhile, all municipal and county-level disease control facilities should be capable of carrying out nucleic acid tests, serological tests and rapid screening tests.