Impacts of Atmospheric Conditions on Influenza in Southern China. Part I. Taking Shenzhen City for Example

Abstract

In this study, we analyse the relationship between the occurrences of influenza in Shenzhen, a rapid developing city in subtropic regions of southern China with over 10 million populations, and the vapor pressure (VP), the concentrations of atmospheric pollutants (SO2, NO2, PM10) for the period of 2003 - 2008. Using the data such as the rate of Influ- en-za-Like-Illness (ILI (%)), the concentrations of pollutants and vapor pressure, we show quite different results from pre-vious research conducted in other regions in China which are dominated by temperate climate and with influenza out-break in Winter and Autumn. Our results show that the rate of ILI in Shenzhen reaches its maximum in Summer and minimum in Winter and the concentrations of pollutants were significantly correlated with ILI (%), there are significant positive correlations between ILI (%) and VP which can explain over 25% the variance of ILI (%) variations. Quite surprisingly, both atmospheric SO2 and PM10 concentrations are negatively correlated with ILI (%), this is because acid deposition may limit the spread of disease, the seasonal variations of acid rain in Shenzhen could contribute to the sea-sonality of its influenza. Furthermore, there are some significant correlations between preceding VP and SO2 and PM10 concentrations to ILI occurrence and such connections can be used for ILI predictions.