Dataset Information

Extreme water-related weather events and waterborne disease.

ABSTRACT: Global climate change is expected to affect the frequency, intensity and duration of extreme water-related weather events such as excessive precipitation, floods, and drought. We conducted a systematic review to examine waterborne outbreaks following such events and explored their distribution between the different types of extreme water-related weather events. Four medical and meteorological databases (Medline, Embase, GeoRef, PubMed) and a global electronic reporting system (ProMED) were searched, from 1910 to 2010. Eighty-seven waterborne outbreaks involving extreme water-related weather events were identified and included, alongside 235 ProMED reports. Heavy rainfall and flooding were the most common events preceding outbreaks associated with extreme weather and were reported in 55·2% and 52·9% of accounts, respectively. The most common pathogens reported in these outbreaks were Vibrio spp. (21·6%) and Leptospira spp. (12·7%). Outbreaks following extreme water-related weather events were often the result of contamination of the drinking-water supply (53·7%). Differences in reporting of outbreaks were seen between the scientific literature and ProMED. Extreme water-related weather events represent a risk to public health in both developed and developing countries, but impact will be disproportionate and likely to compound existing health disparities.

SUBMITTER: Cann KF

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3594835 | biostudies-literature | 2013 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Extreme water-related weather events and waterborne disease.

Cann K F KF Thomas D Rh DR Salmon R L RL Wyn-Jones A P AP Kay D D

Epidemiology and infection 20120809 4

Global climate change is expected to affect the frequency, intensity and duration of extreme water-related weather events such as excessive precipitation, floods, and drought. We conducted a systematic review to examine waterborne outbreaks following such events and explored their distribution between the different types of extreme water-related weather events. Four medical and meteorological databases (Medline, Embase, GeoRef, PubMed) and a global electronic reporting system (ProMED) were searc ...[more]

PMID: 22877498

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Project description:While many authors have described the adverse health effects of poor air quality and meteorological extremes, there remain inconsistencies on a regional scale as well as uncertainty about the single and joint effects of atmospheric predictors. In this context, we investigated the short-term impacts of weather and air quality on moderate extreme cancer-related mortality events for the urban area of Augsburg, Southern Germany, during the period 2000-2017. First, single effects were uncovered by applying a case-crossover routine. The overall impact was assessed by performing a Mann-Whitney U testing scheme. We then compared the results of this procedure to extreme noncancer-related mortality events. In a second step, we found periods with contemporaneous significant predictors and carried out an in-depth analysis of these joint-effect periods. We were interested in the atmospheric processes leading to the emergence of significant conditions. Hence, we applied the Principal Component Analysis to large-scale synoptic conditions during these periods. The results demonstrate a strong linkage between high-mortality events in cancer patients and significantly above-average levels of nitrogen dioxide (NO2) and particulate matter (PM2.5) during the late winter through spring period. These were mainly linked to northerly to easterly weak airflow under stable, high-pressure conditions. Especially in winter and spring, this can result in low temperatures and a ground-level increase and the accumulation of air pollution from heating and traffic as well as eastern lateral advection of polluted air. Additionally, above-average temperatures were shown to occur on the days before mortality events from mid-summer through fall, which was also caused by high-pressure conditions with weak wind flow and intense solar radiation. Our approach can be used to analyse medical data with epidemiological as well as climatological methods while providing a more vivid representation of the underlying atmospheric processes.

Project description:Extreme weather events (EWEs) are expected to increase in stochasticity, frequency, and intensity due to climate change. Documented effects of EWEs, such as droughts, hurricanes, and temperature extremes, range from shifting community stable states to species extirpations. To date, little attention has been paid to how populations resist and/or recover from EWEs through compensatory (behavioral, demographic, or physiological) mechanisms; limiting the capacity to predict species responses to future changes in EWEs. Here, we systematically reviewed the global variation in species' demographic responses, resistance to, and recovery from EWEs across weather types, species, and biogeographic regions. Through a literature review and meta-analysis, we tested the prediction that population abundance and probability of persistence will decrease in populations after an EWE and how compensation affects that probability. Across 524 species population responses to EWEs reviewed (27 articles), we noted large variation in responses, such that, on average, the effect of EWEs on population demographics was not negative as predicted. The majority of species populations (80.4%) demonstrated compensatory mechanisms during events to reduce their deleterious effects. However, for populations that were negatively impacted, the demographic consequences were severe. Nearly 20% of the populations monitored experienced declines of over 50% after an EWE, and 6.8% of populations were extirpated. Population declines were reflected in a reduction in survival. Further, resilience was not common, as 80.0% of populations that declined did not recover to before EWE levels while monitored. However, average monitoring time was only two years with over a quarter of studies tracking recovery for less than the study species generation time. We conclude that EWEs have positive and negative impacts on species demography, and this varies by taxa. Species population recovery over short-time intervals is rare, but long-term studies are required to accurately assess species resilience to current and future events.

Dataset Information

Extreme water-related weather events and waterborne disease.

Publications

Extreme water-related weather events and waterborne disease.

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