Immediate health needs following earthquakes in Türkiye and Syria are mostly related to trauma and the disruption of healthcare, however, infectious disease threats may be concerning in the following two to four weeks.
Chikungunya is not endemic in the EU/EEA and the majority of the cases are travellers infected outside of the EU/EEA. When the environmental conditions are favourable, in areas where Ae. albopictus is established, viraemic travel-related cases may generate a local transmission of the virus as demonstrated by the sporadic events of chikungunya virus transmission since 2007.
This issue of the Communicable Disease Threats Report (CDTR) covers the period 23-29 January 2023 and includes updates on COVID-19, diphtheriae, influenza, chikungunya, dengue and poliomyelitis.
Salmonellosis is the second most commonly reported gastrointestinal infection, and an important cause of food-borne outbreaks in the EU/EEA. In 2019, 89 066 laboratory-confirmed cases of salmonellosis were reported, out of which 139 were fatal.
This issue of the CDTR covers the period 18-24 December 2022 and includes updates on chikungunya, cholera, COVID-19, dengue, C. diphtheriae, Ebola, influenza A(H5N1), Influenza A(H9N2), mass gathering monitoring, Mpox, swine influenza.
Hepatitis A cases in 2021 were at their lowest levels since EU-level hepatitis A surveillance began in 2007, while five other food and waterborne diseases are rising towards pre-pandemic levels. The information is revealed in the Annual Epidemiological Report 2021, of which six chapters are published today by ECDC.
In 2021, 30 EU/EEA countries reported 3 864 cases of hepatitis A (Table 1). The EU/EEA notification rate was 0.9 cases per 100 000 population. In 2021, both the lowest number of reported cases and the lowest notification rate were reported since the beginning of EU-level hepatitis A surveillance in 2007. The total number of hepatitis A cases reported in EU/EEA countries in 2021 represented a decrease of 65.7% and 12.3% compared to 2019 and 2020, respectively.