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. 2023 Jun 1;8(Suppl 3):33-61.
doi: 10.25646/11401. eCollection 2023 Jun.

Impact of climate change on vector- and rodent-borne infectious diseases

Sandra Beermann  1 , Gerhard Dobler  2 , Mirko Faber  3 , Christina Frank  3 , Birgit Habedank  4 , Peter Hagedorn  5 , Helge Kampen  6 , Carola Kuhn  4 , Teresa Nygren  3 , Jonas Schmidt-Chanasit  7 , Erik Schmolz  4 , Klaus Stark  3 , Rainer G Ulrich  8   9 , Sabrina Weiss  10 , Hendrik Wilking  3
Affiliations

Impact of climate change on vector- and rodent-borne infectious diseases

Sandra Beermann et al. J Health Monit. .

Abstract

Background: Endemic and imported vector- and rodent-borne infectious agents can be linked to high morbidity and mortality. Therefore, vector- and rodent-borne human diseases and the effects of climate change are important public health issues.

Methods: For this review, the relevant literature was identified and evaluated according to the thematic aspects and supplemented with an analysis of surveillance data for Germany.

Results: Factors such as increasing temperatures, changing precipitation patterns, and human behaviour may influence the epidemiology of vector- and rodent-borne infectious diseases in Germany.

Conclusions: The effects of climatic changes on the spread of vector- and rodent-borne infectious diseases need to be further studied in detail and considered in the context of climate adaptation measures.

Keywords: ARBOVIRUSES; CLIMATE CHANGE; PUUMALA ORTHOHANTAVIRUS; RESERVOIR HOSTS; VECTORS; ZOONOSES.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of interest Sandra Beermann declares that she has been seconded to the Federal Ministry of Health since June 2022. The other authors declare that there are no conflicts of interest.

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
The climate (top) influences vectors and reservoir hosts as well as human behaviour (middle) and thereby vector- and rodent-borne pathogens (bottom) and the infectious diseases they cause Illustration: Guido Hegasy
Figure 2
Figure 2
Development of tick-borne encephalitis risk areas, 2007-2022 Source: Robert Koch Institute
Figure 3
Figure 3
Representative estimates of Borrelia burgdorferi seroprevalence in adults (18-79 years) and children and adolescents (3-17 years) in Germany, 1997-2017 Source: Own representation after Woudenberg et al. [98].
Figure 4
Figure 4
Distribution of Puumala orthohantavirus sequences in Germany. The symbols correspond to those in Figure 6 and show infections from known endemic areas in Germany. Multiple sequences from the same location are shown only once. Sequences originating from humans are depicted in black, those from bank voles in blue. The dotted line represents the hypothetical distribution boundary of PUUV-positive bank voles. Source: Own representation after Drewes et al. [108] and Weiss et al. [ (CC BY 4.0)]
Figure 5
Figure 5
Reported hantavirus cases by region, year and month of disease onset in Germany, 2001-2021 (n=14.786 cases with known date). Arrows indicate beech mast years (>40% of beech trees showing medium or high fructification) in Baden-Württemberg [117]. Source: Own representation
Figure 6
Figure 6
Phylogenetic analysis of Puumala orthohantavirus S-segment sequence based on a 504 nucleotide alignment of 258 sequences published in GenBank Source: Own representation after Drewes et al. [108] and Weiss et al. [ (CC BY 4.0)]
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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