Abstract
The risk of increasing dengue (DEN) and chikungunya (CHIK) epidemics impacts 240 million people, health systems, and the economy in the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region. The aim of this systematic review is to monitor trends in the distribution and spread of DEN/CHIK over time and geographically for future reliable vector and disease control in the HKH region. We conducted a systematic review of the literature on the spatiotemporal distribution of DEN/CHIK in HKH published up to 23 January 2020, following Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines. In total, we found 61 articles that focused on the spatial and temporal distribution of 72,715 DEN and 2334 CHIK cases in the HKH region from 1951 to 2020. DEN incidence occurs in seven HKH countries, i.e., India, Nepal, Bhutan, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and Myanmar, and CHIK occurs in four HKH countries, i.e., India, Nepal, Bhutan, and Myanmar, out of eight HKH countries. DEN is highly seasonal and starts with the onset of the monsoon (July in India and June in Nepal) and with the onset of spring (May in Bhutan) and peaks in the postmonsoon season (September to November). This current trend of increasing numbers of both diseases in many countries of the HKH region requires coordination of response efforts to prevent and control the future expansion of those vector-borne diseases to nonendemic areas, across national borders.
Highlights
Dengue (DEN) is one of the fastest spreading infectious human diseases of the twenty-first century, and chikungunya (CHIK) is an emerging public health threat worldwide [1]
A systematic literature review was performed in order to summarize information on the spatiotemporal distribution of DEN/CHIK in the Hindu Kush Himalayan (HKH) region, following the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) guidelines
The recent study in Afghanistan [90] reported the first locally acquired dengue virus (DENV) cases in 2019, our study shows that dengue antibodies were detected earlier, in between 2010 and 2011, among Afghan National Army recruits in Afghanistan
Summary
Dengue (DEN) is one of the fastest spreading infectious human diseases of the twenty-first century, and chikungunya (CHIK) is an emerging public health threat worldwide [1]. DEN is caused by the dengue virus (DENV), which is distinguished in 4 serotypes, DENV-1 to -4 and CHIK, by the chikungunya virus (CHIKV) [2,3]. According to estimates of the World Health Organization (WHO), around 100 million. DEN infections occur worldwide annually, and approximately 2.5 billion of the world’s population live in DEN-endemic areas [4]. It has a major socioeconomic and public health impact on the epidemic. Res. Public Health 2020, 17, 6656; doi:10.3390/ijerph17186656 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph
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