Abstract

Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) and Zika virus (ZIKV) have recently emerged as globally important infections. This study aimed to explore the spatiotemporal heterogeneity in the occurrence of CHIKV and ZIKV outbreaks throughout the major international seaport city of Barranquilla, Colombia in 2014 and 2016 and the potential for clustering. Incidence data were fitted using multiple Bayesian Poisson models based on multiple explanatory variables as potential risk factors identified from other studies and options for random effects. A best fit model was used to analyse their case incidence risks and identify any risk factors during their epidemics. Neighbourhoods in the northern region were hotspots for both CHIKV and ZIKV outbreaks. Additional hotspots occurred in the southwestern and some eastern/southeastern areas during their outbreaks containing part of, or immediately adjacent to, the major circular city road with its import/export cargo warehouses and harbour area. Multivariate conditional autoregressive models strongly identified higher socioeconomic strata and living in a neighbourhood near a major road as risk factors for ZIKV case incidences. These findings will help to appropriately focus vector control efforts but also challenge the belief that these infections are driven by social vulnerability and merit further study both in Barranquilla and throughout the world’s tropical and subtropical regions.

Highlights

  • Since 2013, the two emerging arboviruses, chikungunya virus (CHIKV) and Zika virus (ZIKV), transmitted by the same vector species (Aedes aegypti) as the dengue viruses (DENVs), have caused major outbreaks throughout the Americas

  • The monthly analysis of local autocorrelation showed that the Chikungunya virus (CHIKV) epidemic began within hotspots in the northern area and moved quickly to the southwestern region of this city, affecting mostly the poorest communities, following the main western circular route that was connected via a road with the principal truck transport depot and the southern road route to the city of Cartagena (Figures 1 and 3)

  • The evidence we present here indicates that either the CHIKV and ZIKV epidemics occurred in different ecological niches or the case reporting of ZIKV

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Summary

Introduction

Since 2013, the two emerging arboviruses, chikungunya virus (CHIKV) and Zika virus (ZIKV), transmitted by the same vector species (Aedes aegypti) as the dengue viruses (DENVs), have caused major outbreaks throughout the Americas. CHIKV is thought to have first arrived in the Caribbean region in 2013, and in 2014, it expanded to the mainland regions of Central and South America [1,2,3]. The first autochthonous ZIKV cases were reported in the northeastern region of Brazil in late 2014 [4]. By February 2016, local transmission of ZIKV was reported in over 20 countries in the Americas, Int. J. Res. Public Health 2019, 16, 1759; doi:10.3390/ijerph16101759 www.mdpi.com/journal/ijerph

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