16 research outputs found
Malaria transmission pattern resilience to climatic variability is mediated by insecticide-treated nets
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Malaria is an important public-health problem in the archipelago of Vanuatu and climate has been hypothesized as important influence on transmission risk. Beginning in 1988, a major intervention using insecticide-treated bed nets (ITNs) was implemented in the country in an attempt to reduce <it>Plasmodium </it>transmission. To date, no study has addressed the impact of ITN intervention in Vanuatu, how it may have modified the burden of disease, and whether there were any changes in malaria incidence that might be related to climatic drivers.</p> <p>Methods and findings</p> <p>Monthly time series (January 1983 through December 1999) of confirmed <it>Plasmodium falciparum </it>and <it>Plasmodium vivax </it>infections in the archipelago were analysed. During this 17 year period, malaria dynamics underwent a major regime shift around May 1991, following the introduction of bed nets as a control strategy in the country. By February of 1994 disease incidence from both parasites was reduced by at least 50%, when at most 20% of the population at risk was covered by ITNs. Seasonal cycles, as expected, were strongly correlated with temperature patterns, while inter-annual cycles were associated with changes in precipitation. Following the bed net intervention, the influence of environmental drivers of malaria dynamics was reduced by 30–80% for climatic forces, and 33–54% for other factors. A time lag of about five months was observed for the qualitative change ("regime shift") between the two parasites, the change occurring first for <it>P. falciparum</it>. The latter might be explained by interspecific interactions between the two parasites within the human hosts and their distinct biology, since <it>P. vivax </it>can relapse after a primary infection.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The Vanuatu ITN programme represents an excellent example of implementing an infectious disease control programme. The distribution was undertaken to cover a large, local proportion (~80%) of people in villages where malaria was present. The successful coverage was possible because of the strategy for distribution of ITNs by prioritizing the free distribution to groups with restricted means for their acquisition, making the access to this resource equitable across the population. These results emphasize the need to implement infectious disease control programmes focusing on the most vulnerable populations.</p
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Detecting discontinuities in time series of upper air data: Demonstration of an adaptive filter technique
The issue of global climate change due to increased anthropogenic emissions of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has gained considerable attention and importance. Climate change studies require the interpretation of weather data collected in numerous locations and/or over the span of several decades. Unfortunately, these data contain biases caused by changes in instruments and data acquisition procedures. It is essential that biases are identified and/or removed before these data can be used confidently in the context of climate change research. The purpose of this paper is to illustrate the use of an adaptive moving average filter and compare it with traditional parametric methods. The advantage of the adaptive filter over traditional parametric methods is that it is less effected by seasonal patterns and trends. The filter has been applied to upper air relative humidity and temperature data. Applied to generated data, the filter has a root mean squared error accuracy of about 600 days when locating changes of 0.1 standard deviations and about 20 days for changes of 0.5 standard deviations. In some circumstances, the accuracy of location estimation can be improved through parametric techniques used in conjunction with the adaptive filter