Environmental predictors of West Nile fever risk in Europe

Tran, Annelise; Súdre, Bertrand; Paz, Shlomit; Rossi, Massimiliano; Desbrosse, Annie; Chevalier, Véronique; Semenza, Jan C.

doi:10.1186/1476-072x-13-26

Cited by 87 publications

(110 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…The sensitivity of case detection was assumed similar between administrative districts and countries. This dataset was generated from several sources, as described in [30]. Two quantitative predictors were analysed: the proportion of pixels for which the predicted risk was >50% (i.e.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geographic variations of the bird-borne structural risk of West Nile virus circulation in Europe

et al. 2017

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The structural risk of West Nile Disease results from the usual functioning of the socio-ecological system, which may favour the introduction of the pathogen, its circulation and the occurrence of disease cases. Its geographic variations result from the local interactions between three components: (i) reservoir hosts, (ii) vectors, both characterized by their diversity, abundance and competence, (iii) and the socio-economic context that impacts the exposure of human to infectious bites. We developed a model of bird-borne structural risk of West Nile Virus (WNV) circulation in Europe, and analysed the association between the geographic variations of this risk and the occurrence of WND human cases between 2002 and 2014. A meta-analysis of WNV serosurveys conducted in wild bird populations was performed to elaborate a model of WNV seropositivity in European bird species, considered a proxy for bird exposure to WNV. Several eco-ethological traits of bird species were linked to seropositivity and the statistical model adequately fitted species-specific seropositivity data (area under the ROC curve: 0.85). Combined with species distribution maps, this model allowed deriving geographic variations of the bird-borne structural risk of WNV circulation. The association between this risk, and the occurrence of WND human cases across the European Union was assessed. Geographic risk variations of bird-borne structural risk allowed predicting WND case occurrence in administrative districts of the EU with a sensitivity of 86% (95% CI: 0.79–0.92), and a specificity of 68% (95% CI: 0.66–0.71). Disentangling structural and conjectural health risks is important for public health managers as risk mitigation procedures differ according to risk type. The results obtained show promise for the prevention of WND in Europe. Combined with analyses of vector-borne structural risk, they should allow designing efficient and targeted prevention measures.

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Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Geographic variations of the bird-borne structural risk of West Nile virus circulation in Europe

et al. 2017

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“…Indeed, when using epidemiological prediction models, more attention should be paid to the impacts of the changing climate on future transmission of WNV. In a new study, Tran et al [112] used logistic regression models to analyse the status of infection by WNV in Europe and its neighbouring countries in relation to environmental and climatic risk factors. Temperature, remotely sensed Normalized Difference Vegetation Index and Modified Normalized Difference Water Index (MNDWI) anomalies, as well as population, birds' migratory routes and presence of wetlands were considered as explanatory variables.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climate change impacts on West Nile virus transmission in a global context

Paz

2015

Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B

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218

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West Nile virus (WNV), the most widely distributed virus of the encephalitic flaviviruses, is a vector-borne pathogen of global importance. The transmission cycle exists in rural and urban areas where the virus infects birds, humans, horses and other mammals. Multiple factors impact the transmission and distribution of WNV, related to the dynamics and interactions between pathogen, vector, vertebrate hosts and environment. Hence, among other drivers, weather conditions have direct and indirect influences on vector competence (the ability to acquire, maintain and transmit the virus), on the vector population dynamic and on the virus replication rate within the mosquito, which are mostly weather dependent. The importance of climatic factors (temperature, precipitation, relative humidity and winds) as drivers in WNV epidemiology is increasing under conditions of climate change. Indeed, recent changes in climatic conditions, particularly increased ambient temperature and fluctuations in rainfall amounts, contributed to the maintenance (endemization process) of WNV in various locations in southern Europe, western Asia, the eastern Mediterranean, the Canadian Prairies, parts of the USA and Australia. As predictions show that the current trends are expected to continue, for better preparedness, any assessment of future transmission of WNV should take into consideration the impacts of climate change.

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“…This framework provides a means of weighting the results from syndromic surveillance, and thus, additional information can be easily added. Then, a next step in the early detection of WNV outbreaks should be to test the efficiency of the method with other data, such as the predicted abundance of mosquitoes (Calistri et al 2014, Rosà et al 2014, environmental risk factors (Tran et al 2014), and risk of introduction , Bessell et al 2014). In addition, the Bayesian approach could be easily adapted to spatiotemporal analysis.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluation of a Multivariate Syndromic Surveillance System for West Nile Virus

Faverjon

Andersson

Decors

et al. 2016

Vector-Borne and Zoonotic Diseases

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Background: Various methods are currently used for the early detection of West Nile virus (WNV) but their outputs are not quantitative and/or do not take into account all available information. Our study aimed to test a multivariate syndromic surveillance system to evaluate if the sensitivity and the specificity of detection of WNV could be improved. Methods: Weekly time series data on nervous syndromes in horses and mortality in both horses and wild birds were used. Baselines were fitted to the three time series and used to simulate 100 years of surveillance data. WNV outbreaks were simulated and inserted into the baselines based on historical data and expert opinion. Univariate and multivariate syndromic surveillance systems were tested to gauge how well they detected the outbreaks; detection was based on an empirical Bayesian approach. The systems' performances were compared using measures of sensitivity, specificity, and area under receiver operating characteristic curve (AUC). Results: When data sources were considered separately (i.e., univariate systems), the best detection performance was obtained using the data set of nervous symptoms in horses compared to those of bird and horse mortality (AUCs equal to 0.80, 0.75, and 0.50, respectively). A multivariate outbreak detection system that used nervous symptoms in horses and bird mortality generated the best performance (AUC = 0.87). Conclusions: The proposed approach is suitable for performing multivariate syndromic surveillance of WNV outbreaks. This is particularly relevant, given that a multivariate surveillance system performed better than a univariate approach. Such a surveillance system could be especially useful in serving as an alert for the possibility of human viral infections. This approach can be also used for other diseases for which multiple sources of evidence are available.

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Environmental predictors of West Nile fever risk in Europe

Cited by 87 publications

References 40 publications

Geographic variations of the bird-borne structural risk of West Nile virus circulation in Europe

Geographic variations of the bird-borne structural risk of West Nile virus circulation in Europe

Climate change impacts on West Nile virus transmission in a global context

Evaluation of a Multivariate Syndromic Surveillance System for West Nile Virus

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