Analysis of Leptospirosis Cases and their Relation to ENSO Events in Northeast Argentina

MÜLLER GABRIELA V.; LONDE LUCIANA; FONSECA PAULA; RICARTE RITA

Petrópolis

Taller; School on Modelling Tools and Capacity Building in Climate and Public Health; 2015

International Centre for Theoretical Physics

Northeastern Argentina has been experiencing serious outbreaks of leptospirosis. Geographical and climatic characteristics in the provinces of Santa Fe and Entre Rios favor the habitat of the leptospira bacteria, especially in times of warm weather (Baraballe, 2011). These provinces are surrounded by rivers, and the human exposure during flooding is considered the main risk factor for leptospirosis. The provinces of Entre Rios,Santa Fe and Buenos Aires have been presenting the higher reporting of confirmed cases (MSN, 2014).Due to the re-emergence of leptospirosis, it iscritical to evaluate risk areas, considering not only the record of confirmed cases, but also other determinants for leptospirosis outbreaks, such asclimate, environmental, social and economic variables. The mapping of epidemiological risks, considering both the current situation and future projections based on scenarios of climate change, represent a useful tool formanagement and decision-making. Our hypothesis was that ENSO events affect theprecipitation in Entre Rios and, therefore, higher precipitation values have animpact on the number of leptospirosis cases. The aim of this study was to answer the question ¿do ENSO events have influence on the increase of leptospirosis cases?? and based on this question the following objectives were proposed: i) Tocharacterize the areas with presence of vectors and confirmed leptospirosis during the period of available data. ii) To analyze the relationship between confirmed cases of leptospirosis, precipitation and ENSO events during leptospirosis periods.