Status Report--Retracing the history of the early development of national chronic disease surveillance in Canada and the major role of the Laboratory Centre for Disease Control (LCDC) from 1972 to 2000

Health surveillance is the ongoing, systematic use of routinely collected health data to guide public health action in a timely fashion. This paper describes the creation and growth of national surveillance systems in Canada and their impact on chronic disease and injury prevention. In 2008, the authors started a review process to retrace the history of the early development of national chronic disease surveillance in Canada from 1960 to 2000. A 1967 publication describes the history of the development of the Laboratory of Hygiene from 1921 to 1967. This review is a sequel to that paper and describes the history of the development of national chronic disease surveillance in Canada before and after the formation of the Laboratory Centre for Disease Control (LCDC).