Impact of Meteorological Factors on the Transmission and Outbreak of Dengue

Abstract

The dengue virus (DENV) is an enveloped, single-stranded RNA virus. It's a human viral infection spread by the same arthropods that carry dengue fever (the Flaviviridae family). Climate change, geographical location, and the high population density of the affected areas, i.e., eastern India, specific to the state of Bihar, play major roles in the transmission and outbreak of dengue fever. Before drawing conclusions regarding the DENV outbreak, meteorological factors must be correlated with the number of positive cases. In this study, Pearson correlation coefficients, Spearman rank correlation coefficients, and generalized additive models (GAM) were used to examine the correlations of meteorological parameters, and K-means clustering was applied to find the thresholds of the metrological parameters in relation to the outbreak of the DENV. For the DENV outbreak, a robust early warning system may be created using historical meteorological data from India Meteorological Department state offices and daily DENV cases from the Department of Health, Govt. of Bihar, from 2019 to 2022. This means executive and line agencies will respond and prevent DENV outbreaks based on the meteorological conditions.