Climate Change and Infectious Diseases: Experts Urge Doctors, Medical Professionals to Prepare for New Patterns of Disease, Advocate for Climate Action

Specialists have been stressing the link between climate change and infectious diseases. They urge medical practitioners to brace themselves for novel patterns of disease and advocate for climate action to be taken.

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Be Prepared For New Patterns of Disease

A team comprising infectious disease experts urged for more preparedness and awareness in the medical field to mitigate climate change's effects on disease spread. The study "Infectious Diseases in a Changing Climate" alerts about the spread and emergence of detrimental pathogens. The researchers also urge the community of medical professionals to be updated and trained and to take steps to combat climate change.

George R. Thomspon, the study's lead author and a professor at the UC Davis School of Medicine's Department of Medical Microbiology and Immunology, Department of Internal Medicine, and Division of Infectious Diseases, explains that clinicians must be ready to handle the changes in the landscape of infectious diseases. The professor adds that learning more about the link between disease behavior and climate change could help guide the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of infectious conditions.

The professor encourages practitioners and physicians to stay suspicious regarding diseases on the move. He adds that, with a better understanding of the conditions, more testing and fewer missed cases could result.

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The Landscape of Infectious Diseases Is Changing

There are various causes for infectious diseases. These include fungi, parasites, bacteria, or viruses. Several diseases have animal-to-human or human-to-human transmission.

Vector-borne diseases are a specific type of infectious disease. They are caused by pathogens that vectors, such as ticks and mosquitoes, carry. Some vector-caused diseases are Zika, malaria, and dengue.

The alerting patterns of rain are expanding these vectors' range and active periods. Longer summers and warmer and shorter winters have also been associated with more vector-borne conditions. For instance, conditions caused by ticks, such as Lyme disease and babesiosis, also occur in the winter.

Matthew Phillips, the study's first author and an infectious disease fellow from Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital, explains that tick-borne disease cases have been seen in January and February. The tick season begins earlier and has more activity and a wider range of ticks.

Malaria is another concern. Malaria-transmitting mosquitoes are stretching northward, a change induced by climate change. Rain pattern alterations have resulted in more mosquitoes and a higher disease transmission rate.

Zoonotic diseases have also changed in location and incidence. According to experts, animal natural ranges and migration patterns have also changed.

Because of their loss of habitat, wild animals have been nearing humans. This leads to a higher risk of animal diseases spreading to humans and novel pathogens eventually developing.

The study also noted the emergence of novel fungal infections and changes in some fungal pathogen locations. For example, the Coccidioides fungal infection used to be endemic to dry and hot areas across Arizona and California. However, valley fever has been picked up recently in Washington State.

Not to mention, in the past few years, infectious diseases, including COVID-19, have gravely affected the world.

The team calls for strengthened surveillance of infectious diseases. They also urge medical educators to train clinical practitioners and anticipate alterations in the patterns of infectious disease.