Associations between Meteorological Parameters and Influenza Activity in Berlin (Germany), Ljubljana (Slovenia), Castile and León (Spain) and Israeli Districts

Studies in the literature have indicated that the timing of seasonal influenza epidemic varies across latitude, suggesting the involvement of meteorological and environmental conditions in the transmission of influenza. In this study, we investigated the link between meteorological parameters and in...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2015-08, Vol.10 (8), p.e0134701
Main Authors: Soebiyanto, Radina P, Gross, Diane, Jorgensen, Pernille, Buda, Silke, Bromberg, Michal, Kaufman, Zalman, Prosenc, Katarina, Socan, Maja, Vega Alonso, Tomás, Widdowson, Marc-Alain, Kiang, Richard K
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Berlin - epidemiology
Climate
Correlation coefficient
Correlation coefficients
Disease control
Disease transmission
Environmental conditions
Epidemics
Ground stations
Health surveillance
Humans
Humidity
Immune system
Incidence
Infections
Influenza
Influenza, Human - epidemiology
Israel
Medical laboratories
Meteorological Concepts
Meteorological data
Meteorological parameters
Minimum temperatures
Mortality
Outdoor air quality
Population
Precipitation
Public health
Rainfall
Residence Characteristics
Seasonal variations
Slovenia - epidemiology
Solar radiation
Spain - epidemiology
Specific humidity
Statistical analysis
Subtropical climates
Surveillance
Temperate climates
Temperature
Viral infections
Viruses
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Summary:Studies in the literature have indicated that the timing of seasonal influenza epidemic varies across latitude, suggesting the involvement of meteorological and environmental conditions in the transmission of influenza. In this study, we investigated the link between meteorological parameters and influenza activity in 9 sub-national areas with temperate and subtropical climates: Berlin (Germany), Ljubljana (Slovenia), Castile and León (Spain) and all 6 districts in Israel. We estimated weekly influenza-associated influenza-like-illness (ILI) or Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) incidence to represent influenza activity using data from each country's sentinel surveillance during 2000-2011 (Spain) and 2006-2011 (all others). Meteorological data was obtained from ground stations, satellite and assimilated data. Two generalized additive models (GAM) were developed, with one using specific humidity as a covariate and another using minimum temperature. Precipitation and solar radiation were included as additional covariates in both models. The models were adjusted for previous weeks' influenza activity, and were trained separately for each study location. Influenza activity was inversely associated (p
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0134701