Marini Giovanni, Drakulovic Mitra B, Jovanovic Verica, Dagostin Francesca, Wint Willy, Tagliapietra Valentina, Vasic Milena, Rizzoli Annapaola
Research and Innovation Centre, Fondazione Edmund Mach, San Michele all'Adige, Italy.
Department for Communicable Diseases Prevention and Control, National Public Health Institute "Dr Milan Jovanovic-Batut", Belgrade, Serbia.
Front Public Health. 2024 Jul 17;12:1429583. doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2024.1429583. eCollection 2024.
West Nile virus (WNV) is an emerging mosquito-borne pathogen in Serbia, where it has been detected as a cause of infection in humans since 2012. We analyzed and modelled WNV transmission patterns in the country between 2012 and 2023.
We applied a previously developed modelling approach to quantify epidemiological parameters of interest and to identify the most important environmental drivers of the force of infection (FOI) by means of statistical analysis in the human population in the country.
During the study period, 1,387 human cases were recorded, with substantial heterogeneity across years. We found that spring temperature is of paramount importance for WNV transmission, as FOI magnitude and peak timing are positively associated with it. Furthermore, FOI is also estimated to be greater in regions with a larger fraction of older adult people, who are at higher risk to develop severe infections.
Our results highlight that temperature plays a key role in shaping WNV outbreak magnitude in Serbia, confirming the association between spring climatic conditions and WNV human transmission risk and thus pointing out the importance of this factor as a potential early warning predictor for timely application of preventive and control measures.
西尼罗河病毒（WNV）是塞尔维亚一种新出现的蚊媒病原体，自2012年以来该国已检测到它是人类感染的病因。我们分析并模拟了2012年至2023年期间该国的西尼罗河病毒传播模式。
我们应用一种先前开发的建模方法来量化感兴趣的流行病学参数，并通过对该国人群进行统计分析来确定感染力（FOI）的最重要环境驱动因素。
在研究期间，记录了1387例人类病例，各年份之间存在很大差异。我们发现春季温度对西尼罗河病毒传播至关重要，因为感染力大小和峰值时间与之呈正相关。此外，据估计，在老年人口比例较大的地区，感染力也更大，这些老年人发生严重感染的风险更高。
我们的结果表明，温度在塑造塞尔维亚西尼罗河病毒疫情规模方面起着关键作用，证实了春季气候条件与西尼罗河病毒人际传播风险之间的关联，从而指出了该因素作为及时采取预防和控制措施的潜在早期预警预测指标的重要性。
