Soil salinity and aridity specify plague foci in the United States of America

Abstract

plague is a deadly zoonosis that periodically reemerges as small outbreaks in geographically limited foci where the causative agent Yersinia pestis may reside in soil. We analyzed a dataset of 1.005 carefully documented plague cases that were georeferenced over 113 years in peer-reviewed literature in the contiguous United States. Plotting outbreaks by counties defined as plague foci on geographical maps, we observed a significant co-localization of plague outbreaks with high soil salinity measured by an electric conductivity of >4 dS/ m −1 and aridity measured by an aridity index <0.5. Thus, we identified aridity and soil salinity as significantly associated with ecological risk factors for relapsing plague in the contiguous United States. these results reveal two evolutive parameters that are partially associated with anthropic activities, complicating the epidemiology of plague in the contiguous United States. exploiting aridity and soil salinity data may help in the surveillance of evolving plague foci in the contiguous United States.

Evaluating Variation in Germination and Growth of Landraces of Barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) Under Salinity Stress

“…The problem of salt toxicity is limited to localized regions, though affects a large proportion (6.5%) of land worldwide ( FAO, 2015 ), and is becoming an increasing problem with the irrigation of land with brackish water ( Ayars et al, 1993 ; Umali, 1993 ; Wei et al, 2018 ), the onset of dryland salinity due to climate change ( Rengasamy, 2006 ; Tomaz et al, 2020 ), and deforestation in temperate zones ( Sahagian, 2000 ; Barbieri et al, 2020 ). There is a need to increase production on these increasingly marginal land areas that are being degraded by increasing salinities, where there are already problems in preserving yields.…”

“…Coastal incursion of saline water into groundwater is also a problem, particularly in areas prone to sea-level rise. All these causes of salinity are likely to increase with man-made climate change due to the increase in need for irrigation, impacts on natural vegetation and rising sea levels, respectively ( Paranychianakis and Chartzoulakis, 2005 ; Rengasamy, 2006 ; Barbieri et al, 2020 ) particularly in arid regions ( Corwin, 2021 ).…”

Plague Exposure in Mammalian Wildlife Across the Western United States

“…Climate also plays a role, with time-lagged increases in plague activity seen after precipitation events in semi-arid systems (Enscore et al 2002 , Stenseth et al 2006 , Ben Ari et al 2011 , Schmid et al 2015 ). There have also been recent advances in our understanding of Y. pestis and its potential persistence in soils (Eisen et al 2008 , Barbieri et al 2020 ). The importance of these factors may not be uniform across the regions of the world where plague occurs, making generalities difficult and robust predictions problematic.…”

Plague risk in the western United States over seven decades of environmental change

“…Soil conditions may therefore further constrain the distribution of plague reservoirs (Ayyadurai et al, 2008 ; Baltazard et al, 1964 ; Eisen et al, 2008 ; Karimi, 1963 ). Like other pathogens that can persist in the soil (Carlson et al, 2019 ; Limmathurotsakul et al, 2016 ), provisionary evidence suggests that plague may be limited by soil salinity (Barbieri et al, 2020 ; Malek et al, 2017 ), soil organic carbon, and alkalinity (Neerinckx et al, 2008 ). Though these factors may have limited influence in the short‐term dynamics of plague in any one location, at continental scales, they could reasonably be expected to shape where plague foci have become established.…”