About the Minnesota Infectious Disease Operations Guide

Approved June 2024

The Minnesota Infectious Disease Operations Guide (MIDOG) is the successor to the Disease Prevention and Control Common Activities Framework (DP&C CAF). The MIDOG is the foundation for local public health, providing disease surveillance, prevention, and control resources and services as mandated by Minn. Stat. § 145A, the Local Public Health Act. Minnesota Department of Health's Field Service Epidemiologists support local public health agencies in understanding and implementing the LPH roles and expectations outlined in the MIDOG.

State and local public health departments in Minnesota have a unique responsibility to protect and promote the health of all state residents. This document applies to Minnesota's full governmental public health system, including the Minnesota Department of Health (MDH) and all local governmental public health agencies. Tribal health agencies are an integral part of the public health system in Minnesota. However, due to tribes' sovereign nation status, this document does not outline expectations of tribal health staff. 

Public health agencies shall develop and maintain infectious disease capacity as outlined for their agency in this document or make arrangements to ensure this capacity is present for their jurisdictions. Additionally, it is important that MDH and local public health agencies periodically reevaluate the public health system's infectious disease operations to ensure that the population's needs are being met.

The MIDOG content describes the roles and expectations of all local public health agencies and expectations applicable to only some local public health agencies. The responsibility content notes which responsibilities apply to agencies. Some responsibilities apply to all agencies, some do not apply to agencies, and some apply to a portion of agencies depending on various factors (most commonly capacity, need, and expertise). Roles and responsibilities are also outlined for regional staff (these staff may be MDH, local public health, or community health board staff). At the state level, MDH staff take on the remaining governmental public health infectious disease activities and collaborate on portions of others with local public health and regional staff involvement.

The delineation of expectations in the MIDOG acknowledge that:

• Local public health agency capacity and the needs of local jurisdictions are not uniform across the state, nor do local capacity and need remain static.
• MDH staff cannot take on all the state's governmental public health infectious disease work.
• Logistically, there is too much work for this to be practical, and
• There are activities that need to be informed by or led by staff more directly serving local communities.

The MIDOG has been aligned with the foundational public health responsibilities. The detailed responsibility information in Appendix 1 of the MIDOG document notes how the MIDOG responsibilities align with the foundational public health areas and capabilities.

Download the MIDOG: Minnesota Infectious Disease Operations Guide (MIDOG), Updated 2024 (PDF)

Related: 

• Local Public Health Act
• Infectious Disease Epidemiology, Prevention and Control (IDEPC) Map of Field Service Epidemiologists
• Foundational Public Health Responsibilities and Framework

Background: About the Disease Prevention and Control Common Activities Framework

Developed Nov. 1999; revised Nov. 2001, Feb. 2003, Oct. 2012; reapproved July 2015; replaced by the MIDOG in 2024, above.

Controlling communicable diseases is perhaps the oldest and most fundamental public health responsibility. For decades, it was the primary responsibility of local boards of health and, in fact, the main reason for their creation.

The Disease Prevention and Control Common Activities Framework, first approved by SCHSAC in 1998, was previously the foundation for local public health providing disease surveillance, prevention and control resources and services as mandated by Minn. Stat. § 145A, the Local Public Health Act.

Its intent was to provide structure for the infectious disease prevention and control (DP&C) activities of detecting acute and communicable diseases, for developing and implementing prevention of disease transmission, and for implementing control measures during outbreaks. It set out the minimum roles and expectations for both local public health agencies and the Minnesota Department of Health to meet this mandate.

For a copy of previous versions of the Disease Prevention and Control Common Activities Framework, please contact the MDH Center for Public Health Practice (health.ophp@state.mn.us).