Department of Preventive Medicine, Shantou University Medical College, No. 22 Xinling Road, Shantou 515041, China.
Shantou University Medical College, No. 22 Xinling Road, Shantou 515041, China.
Int J Infect Dis. 2017 Oct;63:74-76. doi: 10.1016/j.ijid.2017.08.001. Epub 2017 Aug 7.
China experienced an unprecedented outbreak of dengue fever in 2014, and the number of cases reached the highest level over the past 25 years. Traditional sentinel surveillance systems of dengue fever in China have an obvious drawback that the average delay from receipt to dissemination of dengue case data is roughly 1-2 weeks. In order to exploit internet search queries to timely monitor dengue fever, we analyzed data of dengue incidence and Baidu search query from 31 provinces in mainland China during the period of January 2011 to December 2014. We found that there was a strong correlation between changes in people's online health-seeking behavior and dengue fever incidence. Our study represents the first attempt demonstrating a strong temporal and spatial correlation between internet search trends and dengue epidemics nationwide in China. The findings will help the government to strengthen the capacity of traditional surveillance systems for dengue fever.
中国在 2014 年经历了史无前例的登革热疫情爆发，病例数量达到了过去 25 年来的最高水平。中国传统的登革热监测系统存在明显的缺陷，即从收到到传播登革热病例数据的平均延迟约为 1-2 周。为了利用互联网搜索查询及时监测登革热疫情，我们分析了 2011 年 1 月至 2014 年 12 月期间中国大陆 31 个省的登革热发病率和百度搜索查询数据。我们发现，人们在线健康搜索行为的变化与登革热发病率之间存在很强的相关性。我们的研究首次证明了互联网搜索趋势与中国全国登革热疫情之间存在很强的时空相关性。这些发现将有助于政府加强登革热传统监测系统的能力。
