Diseases such as cholera, diphtheria, smallpox, and typhoid had to be reported in London from 1891, and in the rest of England and Wales from 1899. The list of diseases has been increased over the decades and now stands at about 30. Originally the head of the family or landlord had the responsibility of reporting the disease to the local 'Proper Officer' but now this is restricted to the attending medical practitioner, either in the patient's home or at a surgery or hospital.

The prime purpose of the notifications system is speed in detecting possible outbreaks and epidemics. Accuracy of diagnosis is secondary, and since 1968 clinical suspicion of a notifiable infection is all that is required. If a diagnosis later proves incorrect it can always be changed or cancelled.

Statistics were collected nationally at the Registrar General's Office, who already collected data on births, marriages and deaths. The Office was later known as the Office of Population Censuses and Surveys (OPCS) and now as the Office for National Statistics (ONS), but in 1997 the responsibility for administering the NOIDs system transferred to the Communicable Disease Surveillance Centre (CDSC), now the Health Protection Agency (HPA) Centre for Infections (CfI).