Remote sensing and climate data as a key for understanding fasciolosis transmission in the Andes: review and update of an ongoing interdisciplinary project

Abstract

Abstract. Fasciolosis caused by Fasciola hepatica in various SouthAmerican countries located on the slopes of the Andes has been recognized as an important public health problem. However, the importance of this zoonotic hepatic parasite was neglected until the last decade. Countries such as Peru and Bolivia are considered to be hyperendemic areas for human and animal fasciolosis, and other countries such as Chile, Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela are also affected. At the beginning of the 1990s a multidisciplinary project was launched with the aim to shed light on the problems related to this parasitic disease in the Northern Bolivian Altiplano. A few years later, a geographic information system (GIS) was incorporated into this multidisciplinary project analysing the epidemiology of human and animal fasciolosis in this South American Andean region. Various GIS projects were developed in some Andean regions using climatic data, climatic forecast indices and remote sensing data.Step by step, all these GIS projects concerning the forecast of the fasciolosis transmission risk in the Andean mountain range were revised and in some cases updated taking into account new data. The first of these projects was developed on a regional scale for the central Chilean regions and the proposed model was validated on a local scale in the Northern Bolivian Altiplano. This validated mixed model, based on both fasciolosis climatic forecast indices and normalized difference vegetation index values from Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer satellite sensor, was extrapolated to other human and/or animal endemic areas of Peru and Ecuador. The resulting fasciolosis risk maps make it possible to show the known human endemic areas of, mainly, the Peruvian Altiplano, Cajamarca and Mantaro Peruvian valleys, and some valleys of the Ecuadorian Cotopaxi province. Nevertheless, more climate and remote sensing data, as well as more accurate epidemiological reports, have to be incorporated into these GIS projects, which should be considered the key in understanding fasciolosis transmission in the Andes.

The prevalence and spatial epidemiology of cysticercosis in slaughtered cattle from Brazil

“…Consequently, slaughterhouses can be used as potential data sources for animal and public health surveillance studies, by recording evidence of endemicity, as well as indicators of possible regional epidemics or seasonal trends. Other studies have highlighted the importance of identifying the origin of infected herds and tracing of these animals, since it might lead to the identification of high risk areas where the occurrence of taeniasis and cysticercosis would certainly be interrelated (SANTOS, 1993;PARKINSON, 1972;FUKUDA et al, 2003). Although this correlation was not the aim of this study, recent epidemiological data have suggested that some indigenous Brazilian communities (ARAGÃO et al, 2010), and rural villages (GOMES et al, 2002;PRESTES-CARNEIRO et al, 2006).…”

“…Geographic Information Systems technology (GIS) provides a useful tool to establish the relationships of disease data between environmental features at known infected sites and produce epidemiological maps of disease risk (MALONE et al, 1998;FUENTES, 2006). Environmental and remote sensing data might be incorporated within a GIS system and be used for the routine health management programs, including bovine cysticercosis.…”

Towards assessing fine-scale indicators for the spatial transmission risk of Fasciola hepatica in cattle

“…In northern Belgium (Flanders), the yearly cost of infections with this parasite in dairy cattle has been estimated at € 8.2 million or € 30 per adult dairy cow present in the population (Charlier et al, 2007. Because of the dependence on climatic and environmental conditions of both the intermediate hosts and the free-living stages of F. hepatica, there is an important spatial component in the epidemiology of the disease and spatial distribution models have been developed for several regions across the world (Malone and Zukowski, 1992;Yilma and Malone, 1998;Cringoli et al, 2002;Tum et al, 2004;Durr et al, 2005;Fuentes, 2006;Rapsch et al, 2008;Dutra et al, 2010;McCann et al, 2010;Bennema et al, 2011).…”

Socio-environmental variables and transmission risk of lymphatic filariasis in central and northern Mozambique

“…The Wb-bsI is an index based on the monthly rainfall, the monthly PET as well as the T max and T min . This index was originally used for the prediction of fascioliasis transmission in the United States of America (USA) (Malone et al, 1987), in Africa (Malone et al, 1998), in the Andean mountain range (Fuentes, 2006) and in Colombia (Valencia-López et al, 2012). It has also been used for the assessment of malaria transmission in Eritrea (Malone et al, 2003) and to model the ecological niche of hookworm in Brazil (Mudenda et al, 2012).…”