A systematic evidence review of the effect of climate change on malaria in Iran

Abstract

Climate is an effective factor in the ecological structure which plays an important role in control and outbreak of the diseases caused by biological factors like malaria. With regard to the occurring climatic change, this study aimed to review the effects of climate change on malaria in Iran. In this systematic review, Cochrane, PubMed and ScienceDirect (as international databases), SID and Magiran as Persian databases were investigated through MESH keywords including climate change, global warming, malaria, , and Iran. The related articles were screened and finally their results were extracted using data extraction sheets. Totally 41 papers were resulted through databases searching process. Finally 14 papers which met inclusion criteria were included in data extraction stage. The findings indicated that mosquitoes are present at least in 115 places in Iran; they are compatible with climatic zones of Iran. Malaria and it's vectors are affected by climate change. Temperature, precipitation, relative humidity, wind intensity and direction are the most important climatic factors affecting the growth and proliferation of , and the prevalence of malaria. The transmission of malaria in Iran is associated with the climatic factors of temperature, rainfall, and humidity. Therefore, with regard to the occurring climatic change, the incidence of the disease may also change which needs to be taken into consideration while planning of malaria control.

Climatic changes and their role in emergence and re-emergence of diseases

“…These speculations are supported by computer modelling programs which predict the re-emergence of malaria in Europe and USA in the near future (Kuhn et al 2003). On the other hand, in the already endemic countries such as Iran and Zimbabwe, the prevalence of malaria increased in the last few years as reported (Babaie et al 2018;Gunda et al 2017).…”

“…This is attributed to the life cycle of mosquitoes which depend on one stagnant water for laying eggs and for the development of larval stages. Reports concerning the increase in the prevalence of malaria due to climatic changes are already published in Iran (Babaie et al 2018) and Zimbabwe (Gunda et al 2017).…”

The Health Effects of Climate Change: An Overview of Systematic Reviews

“…Since AMSTAR-2 was developed for syntheses of systematic reviews of randomized controlled trials, working with a team member with expertise in knowledge synthesis (AT), we adapted it to suit a research context that is not amenable to randomized controlled trials. We used items 5,6,10,11,12,14,15,16 without modification and modified items 1 to 4, 7 to 9 and 13.…”

“…22 Systematic reviews suggest that meteorological factors, such as temperature, precipitation, humidity, and wind, are associated with diverse vector-borne infectious diseases, including malaria and dengue. 6,9,20,21,30,32,[35][36][37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50] This association was mostly proportional (e.g., higher temperature and increased rainfall associated with vector-borne diseases), although findings were at times conflicting, with some suggesting an inversely proportional association 9 (e.g., decreased rainfall) or no association at all 40 (e.g., with the human puumala hantavirus Infection.) Geographic location, seasonality and potential interaction with other climate-related factors may partly explain these inconsistencies.…”

“…The environmental consequences of climate change such as rising temperatures, more extreme weather events, and increased droughts and flooding are impacting human health and lives. 1,2 Previous studies and reviews have documented the health impacts of climate change; however, they have focused on specific climate effects, 3,4 health impacts, 5,6 countries, [7][8][9] or are no longer up to date. 10,11 To guide future research and action to mitigate and adapt to the health impacts of climate change and its environmental consequences, we need a complete and thorough overview of the research already conducted.…”