Operational guide using the web-based dashboard: Early Warning and Response System (EWARS) for dengue outbreaks

Overview

This guide is an update to the previous version. This revised edition of Operational guide using the web-based dashboard: Early Warning and Response System (EWARS) for dengue outbreaks, second edition aims to provide programme managers with a user-friendly tool that can: (i) analyse and draw conclusions from historic dengue, chikungunya and Zika datasets; (ii) identify appropriate alarm indicators that can sensitively and specifically predict forthcoming outbreaks at smaller spatial scales; and (iii) use these results and analyses to build an early warning system to detect dengue outbreaks in real-time and respond accordingly. Together, these three components will build technical capacity and provide a standardized methodology for predicting dengue outbreaks in countries with great need. Furthermore, this web-based EWARS tool can ensure enhanced, fast and secured communication, between national and subnational levels, and standardized utilization of surveillance data.

The original guide was produced by TDR together with WHO’s Neglected Tropical Diseases (WHO/ NTD) and WHO regional offices in the context of a European Union-financed research programme, the International Research Consortium on Dengue Risk Assessment, Management and Surveillance (IDAMS), to develop an evidence-based, early warning system for outbreak detection and management of dengue fever, chikungunya and Zika outbreaks.