Environmental temperature, cholera, and acute diarrhoea in adults in Lima, Peru.

The effects of environmental temperature, presence and severity of El Niño, presence of cholera in the community, and interactions among these variables on the number of adult diarrhoeal patients attending the Hospital Nacional Cayetano Heredia in Lima, Peru, during 1991-1998, were evaluated. During 1991-1996, an increased number of visits to the hospital due to acute diarrhoea in the warmer months was observed. This periodic pattern was altered in 1997, when rising of the environmental temperature was observed in Lima secondarily associated with a strong El Niño event. A multivariate model was built in which environmental temperature and interaction between environmental temperature and presence of cholera predicted the number of adult patients with acute diarrhoea attending the Hospital Nacional Cayetano Heredia. Monitoring of environmental temperature and presence of cholera may be used as a warning system to predict epidemics of diarrhoea in adults, which may have a tremendous impact on healthcare strategies and management of health services in general.

[1]  Andy Haines,et al.  El Niño and health , 2003, The Lancet.

[2]  A. Fedorov,et al.  Is El Nino changing? , 2000, Science.

[3]  R. Colwell,et al.  Climate and infectious disease: use of remote sensing for detection of Vibrio cholerae by indirect measurement. , 2000, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[4]  E. Gotuzzo,et al.  Surveillance of bacterial pathogens associated with acute diarrhea in Lima, Peru. , 2000, International journal of infectious diseases : IJID : official publication of the International Society for Infectious Diseases.

[5]  A Haines,et al.  Global climate change: the potential effects on health , 1997, BMJ.

[6]  R. Gilman,et al.  Cholera incidence and El Niño-related higher ambient temperature. , 2000, JAMA.

[7]  Mercedes Pascual,et al.  ENSO and cholera: A nonstationary link related to climate change? , 2002, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[8]  Robert E Black,et al.  Effects of EI Niño and ambient temperature on hospital admissions for diarrhoeal diseases in Peruvian children , 2000, The Lancet.

[9]  Rita R. Colwell.  Global Climate and Infectious Disease: The Cholera Paradigm* , 1996, Science.

[10]  E Salazar-Lindo,et al.  El Niño and diarrhoea and dehydration in Lima, Peru , 1997, The Lancet.

[11]  J. Morris,et al.  Cholera in Lima, Peru, correlates with prior isolation of Vibrio cholerae from the environment. , 1997, American journal of epidemiology.

[12]  J. Patz,et al.  New insights on the emergence of cholera in Latin America during 1991: the Peruvian experience. , 2000, The American journal of tropical medicine and hygiene.

[13]  R. Gilman,et al.  Active surveillance for Vibrio cholerae O1 and vibriophages in sewage water as a potential tool to predict cholera outbreaks , 1996, Journal of clinical microbiology.