Increasing climate change conditions may spur infectious diseases that can prove deadly to humankind, finds an alarming study published in the scientific journal Ecography.
The study echoes concerns raised in a recently released G-20 outcome document, wherein India, also noted that climate change will continue to drive health emergencies, including the emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases.
The new study detailed a Europe-wide investigation on the prevalence of protozoans, bacteria and viruses potentially pathogenic to humans and domestic animals in birds and bats in varying climatic conditions. The prevalence of many of these pathogens was associated with temperature or rainfall. It had compiled information on the occurrence of over 75 pathogenic microbes across Europe from almost 400 bird- and 40 bat species. Combining data on occurrence with climatic factors revealed that the occurrence of most pathogens was associated with temperature or rainfall.
“In general, the occurrence of pathogenic bacteria increased in areas with a warm and dry climate. On the other hand, pathogenic viruses prefer moist climates,” said lead author Yanjie Xu from the Finnish Museum of Natural History, University of Helsinki in Finland. The association between climatic factors and pathogens could be investigated on the 17 pathogen taxa with most data. The observed associations varied. “Temperature was positively associated with occurrence of avian flu virus, malaria -parasite, and bacteria that cause chlamydia, salmonella, Q-fever and typhus in birds and bats,” explains university lecturer Arto Pulliainen from the University of Turku Institute of Biomedicine in Finland.
Rainfall had both positive and negative associations with the occurrence of pathogens. For instance, increasing rainfall increased the probability for the occurrence of Usutu-, Sindbis- and avian flu viruses, as well as that of the occurrence of salmonella bacteria. “Usutu- and Sindbis- viruses are vectored by mosquitoes, and rainfall can increase the occurrence of wetlands favoured by mosquitoes.
Similarly, avian flu and salmonella are prevalent particularly in waterfowl, for whom wetlands are also of importance,” said academy research fellow Thomas Lilley from the Finnish Museum of Natural History. In fact, the WHO and partners are launching a global network to help protect people from infectious disease threats through the power of pathogen genomics.
The International Pathogen Surveillance Network (IPSN) will provide a platform to connect countries and regions, improving systems for collecting and analyzing samples, using these data to drive public health decision-making, and sharing that information more broadly.