Spatial dynamic patterns of hand-foot-mouth disease in the People’s Republic of China

Abstract

Abstract. Hand-foot-mouth disease (HFMD) is the most common and widespread infectious disease in the People's Republic of China. Although there has been a substantial increase of HFMD in many parts of the country in recent years, its spatial dynamics and determinants remain unclear. When we collected and analysed weekly data on HFMD cases from 1,456 counties and the corresponding meteorological factors from 1 May 2008 to 27 March 2009, it was found that HFMD was spatially dispersed across the country in the summer and winter, while clustered in the spring and autumn. The spatial variation of HFMD was found to be affected by a combination of climate variables, while its spatio-temporal transmission was largely driven by temperature variations with a 7-week lag implying that (i) the dispersal of the disease can be anticipated based on the variation of the temperature and other climate variables; and (ii) the spatial dynamics of HFMD can be robustly predicted 7 weeks ahead of time using temperature data only. The findings reported allow prompt preparation and implementation of appropriate public health interventions to control and prevent disease outbreaks.

Spatio-Temporal Pattern and Risk Factor Analysis of Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease Associated with Under-Five Morbidity in the Beijing–Tianjin–Hebei Region of China

“…There have been many studies focused on the influence of various factors on HFMD [2,7,11,12,13,16,17,18,19,20,21,22,23,24], and a number of potential risk factors were analyzed in this study. Risk factors relating to socioeconomic variables were collected, including population density, gross domestic product (GDP) per capita of each county, and the proportion of primary/tertiary industry in the study area (Figure 2, Table S1).…”

“…A higher HFMD incidence occurs in China when temperatures are in the range of 70 °F to 80 °F, and when there is higher relative humidity, lower wind speed, and greater precipitation [2]. In addition, the HFMD rate shows a similar trajectory of geometric center to temperature across 47 weeks in China [11]. Similarly, mean temperature and precipitation are significantly associated with the HFMD incidence rate in Singapore [12].…”

Using an autologistic regression model to identify spatial risk factors and spatial risk patterns of hand, foot and mouth disease (HFMD) in Mainland China

“…The epidemics have inter-years periodic characteristics, as they occur once every three years In Malaysia [8]. At the temporal scale of weeks, HFMD incidence has a significant association with weekly temperature and precipitation with 1–2 weeks in Singapore [9] and 7 weeks in China [10]. …”

Using exceedance probabilities to detect anomalies in routinely recorded animal health data, with particular reference to foot-and-mouth disease in Viet Nam

“…Seven known serotypes of FMD have been recorded: A, O, C, Asia-1, and South African Territories (SAT) 1, 2, and 3 (Davies, 2002). Recent studies of FMD in Asia include Ding et al, 2013;Wang et al, 2013;Muroga et al, 2012. FMD is endemic in Viet Nam, with three out of the seven serotypes (A, O, Asia-1) isolated from identified cases on a regular basis. It is observed primarily in cattle, buffalo and pigs.…”