A new automated national register-based surveillance system for outbreaks in long-term care facilities in Norway detected three times more severe acute respiratory coronavirus virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) clusters than traditional methods.

Objective: To develop and test a new automated surveillance system that can detect, define and characterize infection clusters, including coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), in long-term care facilities (LTCFs) in Norway by combining existing national register data.

Background: The numerous outbreaks in LTCFs during the COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need for accurate and timely outbreak surveillance. As traditional methods were inadequate, we used severe acute respiratory coronavirus virus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) as a model to test automated surveillance.