This article {extract} was published in Communicable Diseases Intelligence Vol 30 No 1 March 2006 and may be downloaded as a full version PDF from the Table of contents page.

Results, continued

Table 4. Notifications and notification rates (per 100,000 population), of communicable diseases, Australia, 2000 to 2004

Disease	Notifications					Rate per 100,000 population
	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004
Bloodborne diseases
Hepatitis B (incident)	410	418	392	349	275	2.1	2.2	2.0	1.8	1.4
Hepatitis B (unspecified)*	7,321	8,747	6,677	6,637	5,861	38.2	45.1	34.0	33.4	29.1
Hepatitis C (incident)	504	703	448	477	361	3.3	4.5	2.8	3.0	2.3
Hepatitis C (unspecified)*,†	19,110	19,792	15,906	13,911	12,667	99.8	102.0	81.0	70.0	63.0
Hepatitis D	26	20	23	28	27	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1
Gastrointestinal diseases
Botulism	2	2	0	1	1	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Campylobacteriosis‡	13,661	16,134	14,736	15,323	15,008	107.8	125.7	113.3	116.2	112.2
Cryptosporidiosis	1,144	1,621	3,272	1,225	1,573	6.0	8.3	16.7	6.2	7.8
Haemolytic uraemic syndrome	14	4	11	15	15	0.1	0.0	0.1	0.1	0.1
Hepatitis A	806	538	392	439	315	4.2	2.8	2.0	2.2	1.6
Hepatitis E	9	14	12	14	28	0.0	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1
Listeriosis	66	64	62	70	65	0.3	0.3	0.3	0.4	0.3
Salmonellosis (NEC)	6,099	7,036	7,848	7,042	7,607	31.8	36.2	40.0	35.4	37.8
Shigellosis	490	567	507	444	518	2.6	2.9	2.6	2.2	2.6
SLTEC, VTEC§	43	45	59	52	44	0.2	0.2	0.3	0.3	0.2
Typhoid	56	81	70	51	73	0.3	0.4	0.4	0.3	0.4
Quarantinable diseases
Cholera	2	4	5	2	5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Plague	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Rabies	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Severe acute respiratory syndrome	–	–	–	0	0	–	–	–	0	0
Smallpox	–	–	–	–	0	–	–	–	–	0
Tularaemia	–	–	–	–	0	–	–	–	–	0
Viral haemorrhagic fever	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Yellow fever	0	0	0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Sexually transmissible infections
Chlamydial infections (NEC)||	16,809	20,265	24,426	30,437	35,189	87.8	104.4	124.4	153.2	175.0
Donovanosis	22	32	16	16	10	0.1	0.2	0.1	0.1	0.1
Gonococcal infection	5,862	6,254	6,433	6,828	7,098	30.6	32.2	32.8	34.4	35.3
Syphilis (all categories)	2,028	1,846	2,015	2,012	2,296	10.6	9.5	10.3	10.1	11.4
Syphilis < 2 years duration	235	203	374	480	596	1.2	1.0	1.9	2.4	3.0
Syphilis > 2 years or unknown duration	1497	711	1,115	1,180	1,561	7.8	3.7	5.7	5.9	7.8
Syphilis – congenital	4	21	18	15	11	0.0	0.1	0.1	0.1	0.1
Vaccine preventable diseases
Diphtheria	0	1	0	0	0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Haemophilus influenzae type b	26	20	31	23	15	0.1	0.1	0.2	0.1	0.1
Influenza (laboratory confirmed)¶	–	1,291	3,674	3,491	2,073	–	6.7	18.7	17.6	10.3
Measles	108	140	32	98	45	0.6	0.7	0.2	0.5	0.2
Mumps	212	117	69	82	102	1.1	0.6	0.4	0.4	0.5
Pertussis	5,711	9,325	5,570	5,159	8,557	29.8	48.0	28.4	26.0	42.5
Pneumococcal disease (invasive)	–	1,795	2,430	2,303	2,375	–	9.2	12.4	11.6	11.8
Rubella	313	266	254	55	33	1.6	1.4	1.3	0.3	0.2
Rubella – congenital	0	0	1	3	1	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Tetanus	8	3	4	4	5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Vectorborne diseases
Barmah Forest virus infection	616	1,148	896	1,369	1,052	3.2	5.9	4.6	6.9	5.2
Dengue	197	180	169	854	326	1.0	0.9	0.9	4.3	1.6
Flavivirus (NEC)**	65	38	73	61	49	0.3	0.2	0.4	0.3	0.3
Japanese encephalitis virus	–	0	0	1	1	–	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Kunjin virus††	–	5	0	19	12	–	0.0	0.0	0.1	0.1
Malaria	967	717	469	598	559	5.0	3.7	2.4	3.0	2.8
Murray Valley encephalitis virus	16	6	2	0	1	0.1	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Ross River virus infection	4,160	3,256	1,458	3,832	4,000	21.7	16.8	7.4	19.3	19.9
Zoonoses
Anthrax	–	0	0	0	0	–	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Australian bat lyssavirus	–	0	0	0	0	–	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Brucellosis	28	21	39	19	36	0.1	0.1	0.2	0.1	0.2
Leptospirosis	249	249	163	132	166	1.3	1.3	0.8	0.7	0.8
Ornithosis‡‡	99	136	212	201	235	0.5	0.7	1.1	1.0	1.2
Lyssavirus (NEC)	–	0	0	0	0	–	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Q fever	548	685	784	583	440	2.9	3.5	4.0	2.9	2.2
Other bacterial infections
Legionellosis	470	309	317	340	310	2.5	1.6	1.6	1.7	1.5
Leprosy	4	9	6	5	5	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0	0.0
Meningococcal infection§§	622	700	686	578	408	3.2	3.6	3.5	2.9	2.0
Tuberculosis	581	963	1,051	993	1,076	3.0	5.0	5.4	5.0	5.4
Total	90,143	105,588	101,718	106,193	110,929

* Unspecified hepatitis includes cases in whom the duration of infection could not be determined.

† In the Northern Territory and Queensland, includes incident hepatitis cases.

‡ Notified as 'foodborne disease' or 'gastroenteritis in an institution' in New South Wales.

§ Infection with Shiga-like toxin/verotoxin-producing Escherichia coli (SLTEC/VTEC).

|| Includes Chlamydia trachomatis identified from cervical, rectal, urine, urethral, throat and eye samples, except for South Australia which reports only genital tract specimens, the Northern Territory which excludes ocular specimens, and Western Australia which excludes ocular and perinatal infections.

¶ Laboratory confirmed influenza is not a notifiable disease in South Australia but reports are forwarded to NNDSS.

** Flavivirus (NEC) replaces Arbovirus (NEC) from 1 January 2004.

†† In the Australian Capital Territory, Murray Valley encephalitis virus and Kunjin virus are combined under Murray Valley encephalitis virus infections.

‡‡ In the Australian Capital Territory ornithosis is reported as Chlamydia not elsewhere classified.

§§ Only invasive meningococcal disease is nationally notifiable. However, New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory and South Australia also report conjunctival cases.

NN Not notifiable.

NEC Not elsewhere classified.

– The condition was not nationally notifiable in that year.

In 2004, the total number of notifications was the highest recorded in NNDSS since the system began in 1991. There was an increase of 4 per cent compared to the total number of notifications in 2003 (Figure 2).

Figure 2. Trends in notifications received by the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System, Australia, 1991 to 2004

In 2004, the most frequently notified diseases were sexually transmissible infections (44,604 notifications, 40 per cent of total notifications), gastrointestinal diseases (25,247 notifications, 23%) and bloodborne diseases (19,191 notifications, 17%). There were 13,206 notifications of vaccine preventable diseases; 6,000 notifications of vectorborne diseases; 1,799 notification of other bacterial infections and 877 notifications of zoonotic diseases (Figure 3).

Figure 3 . Notifications to the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System, Australia, 2004, by disease category

The major changes in communicable disease notifications in 2004 are shown in Figure 4 as the ratio of notifications in 2004 to the mean number of notifications for the previous five years. The number of notifications of chlamydial infections and hepatitis E infections surpassed the expected range (5-year mean plus two standard deviations). Notifications of hepatitis B (incident) and meningococcal infections were below the expected range (5-year mean minus two standard deviations). Notifications for the remaining diseases were within the historical range.

Figure 4. Comparison of total notifications of selected diseases reported to the National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System in 2004, with the previous five-year mean

* Number of notifications surpassed the expected range (i.e. 5 year mean +2 standard deviations).

† Number of notifications was less than the expected range (i.e. 5 year mean –2 standard deviations).

In the financial year 2003–04, there were 92,892 hospital separations in Australian hospitals with a primary diagnosis of infectious diseases (International Classification of Diseases, version 10, Australian Modification (ICD10–AM) codes A01–B99, Australian Institute of Health and Welfare). This represents 1.4 per cent of all hospital separations in th at period. A further 56,675 separations were recorded with a principal diagnosis of influenza or pneumonia (ICD10–AM J10–J18).¹