Abstract：Objective To investigate the epidemiological characteristics of emergency public health events at schools in Hunan Province so as to provide a basis for scientifically formulating prevention and control strategies. Methods Descriptive epidemiological methods were used to analyze the data regarding emergency public health events at schools collected from Emergency Public Reporting System in Hunan Province from 2004 to 2016. Results A total of 1,034 emergency public health events at schools were reported in Hunan Province during 2004-2016, and most of them (94.00%, 972/1,034) were general events. 954 (92.26%) emergencies were infectious disease events, and most of them (76.10%, 726/954) were respiratory disease events. The incidence peaks in each year were from March to June (47.87%, 495/1,034) and from September to November (38.88%, 402/1,034). The majority of the reported events occurred in Changsha (21.57%, 223/1,034). Rural primary and secondary schools were the high risk areas (47.58%, 492/1,034), with the highest incidence rate of 5.93% (χ2=5,925.62, P<0.001). The vaccination against of respiratory infectious diseases was low. Conclusions More attention should be paid to the epidemics of infectious diseases for preventing and controlling emergency public health events at schools. Education as well as health and family planning department should enhance the investment in school health, improve the mechanism of collaboration and intensify the comprehensive prevention and control measures, such as morning and noon inspection, sickness absence registration and immunization program.
2017, Vol. 24 
