The daily report of COVID-19 epidemic situation is ＂zero error＂. How can China CDC do it？

The daily report summary and information release of COVID-19 epidemic situation is a key system, which is related to the overall strategic situation of fighting the epidemic situation, prevention and control decisions and public trust. It is the focus of daily attention of the public, the media and the international community, requiring zero errors, timeliness, accuracy and sensitivity. There is such a team in China CDC, which is on duty 24 hours a day, continuously collecting, sorting out and analyzing the information of confirmed cases, suspected cases, asymptomatic infected persons and other related epidemic situations and epidemiological investigations at home and abroad from the epidemic situation network direct reporting system and other credible sources, completing various reports late at night, and sending out relevant information for 0-24 hours the day before 6 am. The team undertaking this task is "COVID-19 Daily Special Class of China CDC".　

In May, 2020, in order to meet the needs of COVID-19’s normalized epidemic prevention and control work, China CDC undertook the daily report work to realize the integration of COVID-19 epidemic information from multiple sources as soon as possible, so as to meet the increasing and more detailed demand for COVID-19’s epidemic prevention and control information. With a high sense of political responsibility and mission of epidemic prevention and control, the leaders of China CDC and relevant departments and units attached great importance to emergency mobilization, and quickly set up a daily newspaper special class team composed of professionals from nine secondary units in Beijing, headed by the leaders in charge, and with the strong support of logistics, equipment and finance departments, they quickly provided office conditions, equipment and funding guarantees, and overcame technical difficulties one by one. Overcoming various problems and difficulties, it has successfully achieved the glorious task of combining daily epidemic reports with direct online reports and integrating multi-channel information, and has withstood the test of multiple aggregated epidemics and achieved zero errors, which has become a landmark work of China CDC.　

First, develop the information system and create an information platform for daily work.　

To realize the information collection of COVID-19 epidemic daily report based on network direct reporting, it is necessary to expand the content and technical transformation of the original network direct reporting system. The Information Center of China CDC quickly organized and developed the relevant modules of COVID-19 Epidemic Daily, designed a number of statistical tables, and adjusted them in time according to National Health Commission’s requirements, especially increased and met the information reporting requirements of medical observation data of close contact and entry personnel and the summary and analysis requirements of case data. By continuously strengthening the automatic quality control of the system and increasing the logical check between variables, the information is changed from manual query and check after filling in to direct logical check when filling in the information, which effectively realizes the automatic identification and control of ensuring quality from several data sources, and lays an important information foundation for ensuring the daily special class to complete its tasks efficiently and accurately between 3-6 am every day. In addition, the IT personnel of technology development department are on duty 24 hours a day to deal with emergencies, and manual inspection of data with accurate logic is carried out at 10 o’clock every night, which provides strong and timely technical support for the work of special classes.　

Second, multi-source data are gathered to realize the organic integration of multi-channel information.　

The information source of COVID-19 epidemic daily has the characteristics of multi-channels. On the basis of the information directly reported on the network of case infectious disease report cards investigated by medical institutions, it is also necessary to collect multi-channel information such as the epidemiological history of cases investigated by disease control institutions, the medical observation of close contacts and entry personnel, the information notified by Hong Kong, Macao and Taiwan, the information published by the World Health Organization and the information shared by relevant technical support departments. In order to complete the daily early submission task, the comrades in the special class take turns to watch the night shift and eat and sleep in the unit. At midnight, the network direct reporting system completes the data statistics from 0: 00 to 24: 00 the day before, and the members of the special class need to download the network data quickly, sort out and summarize it, and check and compare the data and information received and obtained from various channels on the same day. If the information is inconsistent, inaccurate or missing, they will communicate with the personnel of relevant units in time and guide relevant parties to further investigation. Subsequently, it is necessary to quickly complete the information sorting and summarizing, form various text drafts and charts, and report them in time before 6 am after strict examination, thus ensuring the timely notification and release of epidemic information in COVID-19, China.　

Third, "starting from scratch", established the practical technology of process and data transformation.　

At the beginning of the establishment of the special class, faced with the "three noes" situation: no work plan, no work flow and no complete operation manual, members made full use of their expertise and professional experience to formulate and sort out more than 10 plans and processes in a short time, and constantly improved them in the practice process. It is an important challenge for the efficient work of special classes to integrate data information from multiple sources and convert it into text information and chart information in time to achieve zero errors. In order to overcome the outstanding problem of high error rate in manual writing and charting, the members of the special class give full play to their respective specialties, actively consult relevant experts, develop automatic generation programs for various manuscripts, chart generation and variable audit programs, and constantly adjust the software according to national requirements, thus greatly improving the work efficiency. On the basis of the existing network verification, an insurance is added to ensure the data quality.　

Fourth, the "learning by doing" model has been adopted to build a learning-oriented excellent special class team.　

The special class team was established urgently, with members from different units and different professional backgrounds. The first batch of 9 special class members from secondary units in the center, only one of them was engaged in infectious disease-related work. Faced with the tasks and workload of data integration and information compilation required by 33 submitted materials, it was very difficult to train and build the special class team of COVID-19 Daily. The special class adopts "learning by doing" modes such as explanation, hands-on exercise, case study, simulation exercise and practical exercise, and trains and exercises all kinds of skills of each member of the special class.　

In September, the second batch of nine special class members from the second-level unit of the center had no experience in infectious diseases, and three of them were new employees who just graduated from school and just reported to the unit. In order to ensure the smooth handover, the first batch of daily newspaper classes carefully prepared training contents such as COVID-19 prevention and control plan, manuscript submission, software operation, chart making, data query of direct reporting system and logistics support, and used the duty time to give theoretical training, practical guidance and experience sharing to the second batch of rotation personnel. After three days’ intensive training, two days’ practice, two days’ follow-up practice and three consecutive days’ 72-hour actual combat, the second batch of members of the daily newspaper special class successfully reported the contents of the first independent daily report in the early morning of October 14th, which realized the smooth completion of the rotation and handover of the daily newspaper special class staff.　

In December, the third batch of nine members from the second-level unit of the center, on the basis of the previous two-phase training experience, successfully reported the daily report completed by the third batch of members of the daily newspaper class independently in the early morning of January 18, and successfully realized the second handover.　

Fifth, drive the national team to continuously improve the quality of data reporting.　

The epidemic information of COVID-19 comes from all over the country, so it is necessary to drive the national team for common development. After the establishment of the COVID-19 Daily Special Class of China CDC, the daily contact network of the National CDC was quickly established to communicate with groups and promote training by groups. The daily special class keeps working discussions and business exchanges with the provincial contacts, timely conveys the requirements of the state for submitting information, and makes a detailed interpretation to ensure a consistent understanding of the data connotation, and constantly improves and perfects the information reporting system according to the feedback and demands put forward by the provinces. At the same time, the problems found in daily work should be shared on the national network in time to learn from each other and avoid the same problems. Through the construction of national team network, it plays a vital role in improving the quality of data reporting of the whole system.　

It is believed that under the direct leadership and coordination of National Health Commission, with the great assistance of all provinces and relevant departments, and with the support and organization of China CDC and relevant secondary units, the special class of COVID-19 Epidemic Daily will continue to work hard and fulfill the glorious task entrusted by the party and the people.