WAHIS, the unique source of official worldwide animal health information, is becoming OIE-WAHIS, a new digital platform
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1
World Organisation for Animal Health, France
Delivering timely and high-quality information to allow the management of risks to animals and humans using a “One Health” approach is one of the main mandates of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE). In that context, the 182 OIE-Members should comply with their reporting obligations for the animal health situation through different reports (OIE, 2018). Firstly, Members should report in a timely manner the occurrence of any exceptional epidemiological event related to the 117 OIE-listed diseases (OIE, 2019) and emerging diseases through the early warning system which comprises the submission of Immediate notifications (IN) and the Follow-up reports (FUR). Additional information is submitted through the monitoring system, which includes six-monthly reports (SMR) and annual reports (AR). The SMR are submitted bi-yearly to inform about the evolution of all OIE-listed diseases, the control measures and surveillance applied for each disease in each country. The AR, in contrast, include contextual information on the veterinary, laboratory, diagnostic tests and vaccine production capacities, plus the animal population and zoonotic diseases in each country.
In order to enable Member Countries to report disease events and the general animal health situation as well as to give the general public access to the reported information, the OIE has its own disease reporting system. The first disease reporting system, called Handistatus, contains the information from 1996 until 2004. This system further evolved into WAHIS (World Animal Health Information System) which provides public access to all the information reported by Members from 2005 up to date.
This officially reported information constitutes a unique public source of data on animal health as well as on animal diseases that affect public health (as many of OIE listed diseases are zoonotic, countries report on annual basis for more than 35 zoonotic diseases in humans).
The quantity and quality of data stored in WAHIS was evaluated over time, considering the submission rates and content of the different types of reports. This analysis allowed the identification of the strengths and weaknesses of the system to consequently address them in the development of the new platform OIE-WAHIS.
The results showed that for the early warning system, the quantity and quality of the data collected and stored in WAHIS is remarkable and has increased year on year. As an example: when WAHIS was launched in 2005 only 91 IN and 164 FUR were submitted on 31 diseases from 48 countries. During 2018, these reports went up to 332 IN and 1655 FUR, on 44 diseases from 93 countries. This poses a twofold increase of the number of IN and a tenfold increase in the number of FUR submitted, originated from twice as many countries. This reflects the increase on the coverage of the system. However, the submission of these reports depends, not only on the surveillance capacities and reporting behaviors, but also on the worldwide animal health situation as most of these reports were concentrated in only four diseases, all of them with great impact on trade. Specifically, infection with highly pathogenic avian influenza viruses (considering both OIE-listed diseases for domestic and wild birds) was the most frequently reported disease, with 23% of all reports, followed by African swine fever (17%), foot and mouth disease (10%) and bluetongue (7%).
In addition, the evolution of the reporting characteristics of the monitoring system (SMR and AR) was also evaluated. The SMR have a very high coverage of the world, as about 97% of the Member countries submit them on a regular basis, including information on average on 81% of the OIE listed terrestrial animal diseases (78 diseases). Currently, two types of SMR are submitted, concerning the terrestrial and aquatic animal diseases. In general, for the terrestrial reports, the quality and level of detail of information was quite high, as more than 50% of the terrestrial SMR submitted from 2014 until 2017 included the outbreak data in the most detailed level of information (by month and province). Some differences were also found between the report on domestic animals, for which 86% of diseases were reported, and wild animals with a lower level of reporting (76% of reported diseases). However, the submission rate and quality of information for the reports concerning the aquatic animal diseases is still lower. About 70% of the Members submitted aquatic reports, containing information on 77% of OIE listed aquatic diseases (22 diseases), however mostly reporting no disease present. Finally, the AR have also a very good coverage, having been submitted by most of the countries (average of 95% during the last years). Nevertheless, strong differences were observed between the completeness of the different sections of this type of report.
All this data is currently stored in WAHIS and publicly available in the web interface (WAHIS interface). However, as it is built now, WAHIS presents some limitations regarding making use and correct interpretation of OIE data. Difficulties include the lack of clear explanations about the types of report present in WAHIS (early warning and monitoring), the non- user friendly interface (difficult to access to the different types of data), the lack of extraction and analysis tools for WAHIS data or the presence of old style design static maps, among others.
The OIE, aware of these limitations, is developing a new platform, called OIE-WAHIS. This new reporting system aims to facilitate reporting and improve the correct and wide use and interpretation of the collected official information. For that purpose, OIE-WAHIS is being designed to be a technically advanced, user-friendly, intuitive and efficient system. The new system will incorporate clear explanations about the different reports it contains and the interactions amongst them that will enable the user to select and decide which data source should be used for their interest. High resolution dynamic mappings will be incorporated that will enhance the report and interpretation of outbreaks reported. Analytical dashboards will be also available for the visualization and analysis of the data; by integrating information from all the different reports, users will have an updated, comprehensive picture of the real situation that will support them on the decision making. Data mining tools and easy extraction capabilities will allow the general public to search and extract the data desired for their analysis. In addition, it also contemplates that field reporting will be integrated through new modules and app versions for tablets and mobile devices (always requiring the validation of the corresponding Delegate before the submission of information to the OIE). Finally, OIE-WAHIS will be also ready to connect with other systems, facilitating reporting (avoiding data entry duplications) hence ensuring the correct transfer of information, enabling interoperability.
All these new features will support OIE Members in their reporting obligations of submitting timely high-quality information and providing them better visualization and easy access to analytical tools for the information submitted. This will enable OIE Members to use their reported data for additional purposes besides complying with their reporting obligation. The public users will also benefit from the new tools of the interface, that will allow an easier search and use of the collected data. But in addition, the improved data accessibility and possibility of interaction with other data systems will allow researchers and organisations around the globe to use OIE data for their analysis and perusal, maximizing the value of the data collected. With these advances OIE-WAHIS will become a user-friendly powerful data source to support and improve the early warning and prevention of animal and human diseases.
References
OIE, 2018. Terrestrial Animal Health Code. Chapter 1.1. Notification of diseases, infections and infestations, and provision of epidemiological information.
OIE, 2019: OIE listed diseases.
WAHIS interface.
Keywords:
Animal Health,
Data,
Interoper ability,
open source,
Digital platform,
REPORTING
Conference:
GeoVet 2019. Novel spatio-temporal approaches in the era of Big Data, Davis, United States, 8 Oct - 10 Oct, 2019.
Presentation Type:
Regular oral presentation
Topic:
Spatial data sources, open data, accessibility and information integration
Citation:
Mur
L,
Tizzani
P,
Awada
L,
Lambergeon
N,
Braham
I,
Masse
C,
Caceres
P,
Melens
P and
Arroyo
M
(2019). WAHIS, the unique source of official worldwide animal health information, is becoming OIE-WAHIS, a new digital platform.
Front. Vet. Sci.
Conference Abstract:
GeoVet 2019. Novel spatio-temporal approaches in the era of Big Data.
doi: 10.3389/conf.fvets.2019.05.00058
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Received:
23 May 2019;
Published Online:
27 Sep 2019.
*
Correspondence:
DVM, PhD. Lina Mur, World Organisation for Animal Health, Paris, France, linamurvet@gmail.com
DVM, PhD. Paolo Tizzani, World Organisation for Animal Health, Paris, France, p.tizzani@woah.org