Lessons from the Field

Over 700,000 cases of cholera were reported in Haiti between October 2010 and February 2015. In November 2011, the Cuban Medical Team serving in Haiti established a laboratory-supported sentinel surveillance system for cholera in 10 public hospitals (one in each of Haiti’s 10 departments), to estimate the proportion of hospitalized patients with cholera and detect emergence of new Vibrio cholerae serotypes. Each month, the fi rst ten stool samples collected from patients admitted with acute watery diarrhea were studied in all hospitals involved. Surveillance system fi ndings from November 1, 2011, to October 30, 2012 showed that acute watery diarrhea was caused by V. cholerae serogroup O1 in 45.9% (210/458) of patients: Serotype Ogawa was found in 98.6% of this isolates (207/210) and serotype Inaba in 1.4% (3/210), indicating low circulation level of the latter in Haiti. Continuing laboratory sentinel surveillance of V. cholerae is needed to monitor the spread of the disease and prevent and contain outbreaks, particularly of new serotypes. It is important to ensure that these fi ndings are systematically integrated with data available to MSPP from other surveillance sources.