City heightens disease surveillance campaign

CEBU, Philippines — Cebu City Mayor Nestor Archival is seeking to enhance the city’s disease surveillance and outbreak response capabilities by reinforcing the Cebu City Epidemiology, Surveillance and Statistics Unit (CESSU).

CESSU is responsible for monitoring diseases and analyzing public health trends in the city.

The effort was formalized through Executive Order No. 115, signed on October 14, 2026, which institutionalizes and strengthens CESSU under the City Health Department (CHD) and amends Executive Order No. 21, series of 2025.

In the order, the city government cited provisions of Republic Act No. 11223, or the Universal Health Care Act, which requires local health systems to maintain accurate, sensitive, and timely epidemiological surveillance systems.

The order also referenced Republic Act No. 11332, or the Mandatory Reporting of Notifiable Diseases and Health Events of Public Health Concern Act, which requires local government units to establish or designate epidemiology and surveillance units.

Based on the EO, CESSU serves as the data repository of the CHD, collecting, segregating, consolidating, and analyzing health data from 85 health stations across Cebu City using the Department of Health's Field Health Service Information System.

The information is used to track the city's progress in achieving public health goals and monitor disease trends.

The strengthened unit will be composed of one city epidemiologist, one epidemiology assistant, five disease surveillance officers, one statistician, and one encoder.

The order states that personnel must meet Civil Service Commission qualification standards and be trained in applied or field epidemiology, surveillance, and response. Pending the creation of plantilla positions, qualified personnel may be temporarily designated by the Local Health Board.

CESSU's responsibilities include collecting and organizing epidemiological data, preparing disease trend analyses, conducting outbreak investigations, coordinating laboratory testing and specimen transport, implementing immediate disease control measures when necessary, and providing health facilities and local leaders with information needed for public health interventions.

The unit is also tasked with immediately informing physicians, public health nurses, midwives, and barangay health workers of unusual disease occurrences, cases exceeding epidemic thresholds, or emerging health threats that require prompt attention.

The EO also identifies hospitals and health facilities in Cebu City that are required to regularly report notifiable diseases, including Cebu City Medical Center, Guba Community Hospital, Saint Anthony Mother and Child Hospital, Chong Hua Hospital, Cebu Doctors' University Hospital, Southwestern University Medical Center, Vicente Sotto Memorial Medical Center, Perpetual Succour Hospital, and Visayas Community Medical Center, among others.

Under the order, the collection, processing, and dissemination of disease surveillance data will be undertaken only by authorized personnel and must comply with the provisions of the Data Privacy Act of 2012. — MRM (CEBU NEWS)