title: The Effects of Floods on the Incidence of Bacillary Dysentery in Baise (Guangxi Province, China) from 2004 to 2012.
abstract: Research shows potential effects of floods on intestinal infections. Baise, a city in Guangxi Province (China) had experienced several floods between 2004 and 2012 due to heavy and constant precipitation. This study aimed to examine the relationship between floods and the incidence of bacillary dysentery in Baise. A mixed generalized additive model and Spearman correlation were applied to analyze the relationship between monthly incidence of bacillary dysentery and 14 flood events with two severity levels. Data collected from 2004 to 2010 were utilized to estimate the parameters, whereas data from 2011 to 2012 were used to validate the model. There were in total 9255 cases of bacillary dysentery included in our analyses. According to the mixed generalized additive model, the relative risks (RR) of moderate and severe floods on the incidence of bacillary dysentery were 1.40 (95% confidence interval (CI): 1.16-1.69) and 1.78 (95% CI: 1.61-1.97), respectively. The regression analysis also indicated that the flood duration was negatively associated with the incidence of bacillary dysentery (with RR: 0.57, 95% CI: 0.40-0.86). Therfore, this research suggests that floods exert a significant part in enhancing the risk of bacillary dysentery in Baise. Moreover, severe floods have a higher proportional contribution to the incidence of bacillary dysentery than moderate floods. In addition, short-term floods may contribute more to the incidence of bacillary dysentery than a long-term flood. The findings from this research will provide more evidence to reduce health risks related to floods.
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. xuena_liu@163.com.|Center for Climate Change and Health, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. xuena_liu@163.com.
authors.forename: Xuena
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. Liuzhidong3105@163.com.|Center for Climate Change and Health, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. Liuzhidong3105@163.com.
authors.forename: Zhidong
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: School of Public Health, China Studies Centre, the University of Sydney, New South Wales 2006, Australia. ying.zhang@sydney.edu.au.
authors.forename: Ying
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Department of Epidemiology and Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. bjiang@sdu.edu.cn.|Center for Climate Change and Health, School of Public Health, Shandong University, Jinan 250012, China. bjiang@sdu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Baofa
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Jiang
mesh_terms: D002681:China / Q000453:epidemiology; D002947:Cities; D004190:Disasters; D004405:Dysentery, Bacillary / Q000453:epidemiology*; D055868:Floods / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D011159:Population Surveillance; D012044:Regression Analysis; D012306:Risk
keywords: Spearman correlation; bacillary dysentery; floods; mixed generalized additive model