The V.I. Department of Health has deployed version 7 of the CDC-supported National Electronic Disease Surveillance System Base System, known as NBS 7. The department says the upgrade makes the Virgin Islands one of the first U.S. jurisdictions using the release and the first to host it through Amazon Web Services.
The platform receives and processes reportable-disease information from hospitals, laboratories and healthcare providers. Health officials say the new system gives epidemiologists faster and more reliable tools to identify possible outbreaks, follow disease trends and support public-health decisions.
A peer-reviewed JMIR Medical Informatics report documented the territory's implementation and cloud approach. Territorial Epidemiologist Dr. Esther Ellis, a senior author, said the project also strengthens communication with clinical partners and gives the territory greater control over its public-health data.
The launch is a surveillance-infrastructure change, not an announcement of a new outbreak. The department has not published public measures showing how much reporting or response times have improved, and it has not detailed the platform's cybersecurity, continuity or audit controls in the public announcement.
VIDOH should publish baseline and post-launch reporting times, uptime targets, data-quality measures, privacy and security safeguards, continuity plans and a public dashboard for non-identifiable disease trends.
Source published September 17, 2026. Read the original reporting or release for the complete record.
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