Strengthening post-disaster disease surveillance through field epidemiology support in Indonesia, 2025

Vollständiger Abstract

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Problem: Natural disasters increase the risk of communicable disease transmission while disrupting routine disease surveillance systems, leading to delayed detection of outbreaks and weakened public health decision-making during emergency responses. Context: Indonesia is vulnerable to natural hazards, and Aceh Province has experienced recurrent disasters with significant public health impacts. In late 2025, major flooding and landslides affected Aceh Tamiang District, disrupting health services. Field epidemiology support was deployed to strengthen post-disaster disease surveillance during the emergency response. Action: A field epidemiologist strengthened case detection and registration at health posts, standardized disease recording, verified suspected clusters, and established centralized data compilation, analysis and situation reporting via the Health Emergency Operations Centre. Activities were aligned with World Health Organization functions and were adapted to emergency conditions. Outcome: There was substantial disruption to routine health services, with severe damage to 12 of 15 primary health-care centres and the district health office, and moderate damage to two hospitals. Nevertheless, core surveillance functions were maintained during the emergency response, facilitating the reporting and documentation of multiple outbreak-prone diseases, including typhoid, measles and varicella. Surveillance outputs were used to inform timely risk assessment and response actions, including mobilizing laboratory surge capacity to support diagnostic activities. Discussion: Concrete actions translate field data into timely, structured public health responses. Field epidemiologists can help maintain system functionality in resource-constrained emergencies by adapting to paper and mobile tools, synthesizing fragmented data and coordinating directly with laboratory personnel for case confirmation.