For more than 100 years, RIVM has been promoting public health and safeguarding a healthy and safe environment. We have a central role in infectious disease control, national prevention and population screening programmes and monitoring our population’s health and the state of our environment. We support citizens, professionals and national and local authorities in the challenge of keeping ourselves and our environment healthy, safe and sustainable. Our ambition is to be a trusted advisor using independent research as the basis for our advisory work. Below we present some of the global challenges we work on and elaborate on our tasks and international activities.
Highlighted themes
Climate change and Health
Safe, healthy and sustainable food
Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)
Population Screening programmes
Circular Economy
Immunisation and vaccination
What we do
International collaboration
National tasks and activities
International projects and networks
COVID-19 in the Netherlands
RIVM advises the Dutch government on how to control the coronavirus as effectively as possible, monitors the COVID-19 outbreak and conducts research into SARS-CoV-2. RIVM is coordinating the implementation of the COVID-19 vaccinations in the Netherlands. Our institute is responsible for coordinating the storage and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines in the Netherlands (including the islands of Aruba, Bonaire, St Eustatius, Saba, Curaçao and St Maarten).
We provide weekly updates and data on COVID-19 in the Netherlands. In addition to our general COVID-19 weekly epidemiological update, we also publish a COVID-19 weekly update for the CAS and BES islands: the islands of Curaçao, Aruba and Sint Maarten and the special municipalities Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba. A newsletter for professionals involved in the COVID-19 vaccination is published regularly on our website.
Would you like to be kept informed on our work and activities? Subscribe to our quarterly newsletter. Read our international newsletter issue 1, 2022.
Information for refugees from Ukraine
Information on screening programmes, vaccinations for children, the flu jab and more is available in English, Ukrainian and Russian. We have brought together all information on this web page.
News
SARS-CoV-2 infections continue to rise
Infections with the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 in the Netherlands continued to rise this week. This increase can be seen in sewage surveillance and in the infections reported to the Municipal Public Health Services (GGDs).
Number of STI tests at sexual health centres are rising again
In 2021, more than 138,000 people were tested for sexually transmitted infections (STIs) at a centre for sexual health.
Upward trend in infections continues
Infections with the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 in the Netherlands have increased for the third week in a row. The number of patients admitted to hospital nursing wards remained the same this week.
Nearly twice as many cases involving long-term symptoms after COVID-19
Three months after infection with the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, almost half of people still report one or more long-term symptoms, such as fatigue, difficulty concentrating and loss of smell.
New test for Lyme disease is not reliable
To determine whether someone has Lyme disease, doctors in the Netherlands often use antibody tests. For some time now, so-called cellular tests have been available on the market.
Many more infections, limited increase in hospital admissions
In the past week, the number of people who tested positive for COVID-19 in the Netherlands increased by 64% compared to the week before that.
