School Vacations, Humidity Linked to Waves of Swine Flu in Mexico During 2009 Pandemic Infection Control Today
go to original August 27, 2015

The large outbreak of swine flu that struck the world in 2009, killed over 14,000 people. Get a glimpse at how people dealt with the deadly pandemic in Mexico City. (Seeker Stories)

Scientists studying the 2009 A/H1N1 influenza pandemic have found that the inconsistent regional timing of pandemic waves in Mexico was the result of interactions between school breaks and regional variations in humidity.

The research published in PLOS Computational Biology, led by Dr. James Tamerius at the University of Iowa and Dr. Gerardo Chowell at Georgia State University, applied mathematical models to understand the social and environmental processes that generated two distinct pandemic outbreaks ("waves") in Mexico during the summer and fall of 2009.

...The relationship between humidity and pandemic influenza transmission found in this study is consistent with the relationship observed for seasonal influenza. This suggests that a greater understanding of the mechanisms that drive inter-pandemic influenza epidemics may increase our capacity to predict the timing of major outbreaks associated with novel pandemic influenza viruses in the future.

Read the rest at Infection Control Today

Photo: AFP

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