A new study led by researchers at the Brown University School of Public Health finds that weather conditions such as temperature and humidity can help predict when flu outbreaks occur and how severe they will become across North, Central and South America.
A new study led by researchers at the Brown University School of Public Health finds that weather conditions such as temperature and humidity can help predict when flu outbreaks occur and how severe they will become across North, Central and South America.
The findings, published in PNAS Nexus, suggest how climate change could reshape future flu seasons, with some tropical regions potentially experiencing stronger outbreaks while places with distinct seasons and colder winters could see somewhat smaller outbreaks.
“Investigating how climate affects influenza transmission across different locations is crucial for predicting outbreaks in the present, and in the future as the climate changes,” said first author Aleksandra Stamper, a Ph.D. candidate in Epidemiology at Brown University. “By understanding transmission as a function of humidity and temperature, we can reliably predict how the seasonal influenza outbreak in a state like Wisconsin will differ from the seasonal outbreak in Costa Rica.”
Read more at: Brown University
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