Journal
PLOS ONE
Volume 11, Issue 3, Pages -Publisher
PUBLIC LIBRARY SCIENCE
DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0150180
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Funding
- National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, National Institutes of Health, USA [AI070908]
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This study aims to examine the spatio-temporal dynamics of Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF) prevalence in four contiguous states of Midwestern United States, and to determine the impact of environmental and socio-economic factors associated with this disease. Bayesian hierarchical models were used to quantify space and time only trends and spatio-temporal interaction effect in the case reports submitted to the state health departments in the region. Various socio-economic, environmental and climatic covariates screened a priori in a bivariate procedure were added to a main-effects Bayesian model in progressive steps to evaluate important drivers of RMSF space-time patterns in the region. Our results show a steady increase in RMSF incidence over the study period to newer geographic areas, and the posterior probabilities of county-specific trends indicate clustering of high risk counties in the central and southern parts of the study region. At the spatial scale of a county, the prevalence levels of RMSF is influenced by poverty status, average relative humidity, and average land surface temperature (> 35 degrees C) in the region, and the relevance of these factors in the context of climate-change impacts on tick-borne diseases are discussed.
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