Revised COVID-19 case definitions

WHO has published revised interim guidance on public health surveillance for COVID-19 cases. This document includes revision of suspected and probable case definitions to integrate increased knowledge on the clinical spectrum of COVID-19 signs and symptoms.

WHO has published revised interim guidance on public health surveillance for COVID-19 cases. This document provides guidance to Member States on the implementation of surveillance for COVID-19 and the reporting requirements for WHO.

What is new in this revised version:

• revision of suspected and probable case definitions to integrate increased knowledge on the clinical spectrum of COVID19 signs and symptoms;
• updated approaches to surveillance, including environmental and serological surveillance for SARS-CoV-2;
• revision of variables included in weekly surveillance to fit with new case definitions and surveillance objectives (that is, inclusion of probable cases, health-care worker cases and updated age groups for reporting cases and deaths);
• information on the importance of the collection of metadata for analysis and interpretation of surveillance data;
• recommendations for ending case-based reporting for global surveillance and replacing it with aggregate reporting.