Do the floods have the impacts on vector-born diseases in Taiwan?

Do the floods have the impacts on vector-born

diseases in Taiwan?

王宗倫

Wang TL;Chang H;;;

To investigate if the Typhoon Nari that occurred in September 6 2001 had any impacts on communicative diseases in Taiwan, we surveyed the data from the Epidemiological Bulletins published in Center for Disease Control (Taiwan) from January 2000 to April 2002. The medians of confirmed cases for dengue fever, Japanese encephalitis and rickettsia were 3, 0 and 14, respectively. The gradual sur ge of dengue fever was noted since October 2001 and persisted for 7 months. Rickettsia infection had the same tendency and persisted for even five months. Analysis of the run charts revealed that there were no endemic episodes of Japanese encephalitis after Nari. For dengue fever, there were two surges; that is, one being the period from August 2000 to November 2000, the other being the period from October 2001 to April 2002. According to the analysis of the curve, the latter surge was statistically significant. There were also two surges over the observation period for rickettsia infection. The first one was during May 2000 to January 2001, whereas the second one during November 2001 to March 2002. However, neither of the surges met the criteria of significance. In conclusion, the floods due to Nari actually brought the endemic outbreaks of dengue fever. Vector control remains an important issue for post-flood disease surveillance. (Ann. Disaster Med 2002;1:43-50)