One of our members, Josh Colston, an epidemiologist at the University of Virginia School of Medicine, collaborated on a new study that reinforces the importance of using weather data to tackle this growing health threat, offering a promising decision-making tool to safeguard vulnerable populations.
“My colleagues at the University of Utah had already found that by adding in weather data, such as temperature and rainfall, to clinical information, they could better predict the causes of severe diarrhoea,” Colston explains.
The interesting part is that this new study shows that whether you use data from weather stations or models, the predictions are about equally good.
“This is important for the SPRINGS project because we’ll also be using weather data from global models and linking those to predictions of the causes of diarrhoeal disease,” he says.
Diarrhoeal diseases cause around half a million deaths annually in children under five, and climate change is making it worse. Higher temperatures fuel bacterial growth, heavy rains contaminate water supplies, and droughts reduce access to clean water. This is making waterborne diseases more common and dangerous.
The study, which compared satellite-estimated weather data with traditional weather station measurements, showed that both methods work similarly well in predicting diarrhoea causes.
“This finding could have significant implications for global health initiatives like SPRINGS, since our project aims to address the impact of climate change on diarrhoeal diseases through improved surveillance and climate-resilient water systems. It is a good indicator that we are on the right track in SPRINGS,” Colston concludes.
Have a read of the study: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/epidemiology-and-infection/article/assessment-and-comparison-of-model-estimated-and-directly-observed-weather-data-for-prediction-of-diarrhoea-aetiology/962939C04F42C0D6F4AB091AB3B61039
SPRINGS is an EU-funded project focused on addressing the impact of climate change on waterborne diarrheal diseases. Diarrheal diseases are currently the third leading cause of death in children under 5 years of age globally. Compounded by global climate projections indicating increased precipitation, flooding, and drought, there is a looming threat to the progress made in reducing diarrheal disease burden. To inform and prioritise effective political responses, SPRINGS is building 4 case studies in Italy, Ghana, Romania, and Tanzania with contrasting vulnerabilities.