Starting with the Oct. 23 2015 Supplements to Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report (MMWR), CDC announced it will publish the summaries of all notifiable conditions – infectious and noninfectious – at the same time. Together, these two reports provide official statistics for all nationally notifiable conditions in the same MMWR volume.

Notifiable diseases and conditions—which include foodborne disease outbreaks—are those for which regular, frequent, and timely information is necessary for prevention and control. Monitoring this data gives CDC and other public health authorities the ability to detect and respond to sudden changes in the occurrence and distribution of health threats. State and local health departments voluntarily submit the data to CDC.

“Tracking and responding to infectious and noninfectious diseases is a major part of CDC’s mission to protect America’s health,” said CDC Director Tom Frieden, “These annual summaries let us take the nation’s pulse and see where we are succeeding and what we need to do better.”

The reports being released are the Summary of Notifiable Infectious Diseases and Conditions — United States, 2013, and the Summary of Notifiable Noninfectious Conditions and Disease Outbreaks — United States. Together, the reports are referred to as the Summary (Infectious and Noninfectious). The reports were prepared by CDC in collaboration with the Council of State and Territorial Epidemiologists (CSTE).