FloDisMod – A Framework for Flood and Disease Modeling

Climate-sensitive infectious diseases more often than ever pose a threat to humankind with pandemic potential (1).

The Wellcome Trust has identified 37 tools with a climate component used for the analysis of infectious diseases, most of which (81%) are focused on vector-borne diseases. Furthermore, most tools available are for areas where the disease is already endemic.

Soil and water-borne infectious diseases outbreaks are linked to seasonal weather patterns and extreme weather conditions in the coastal areas, such as coastal flooding and storm surge, which will be becoming more frequent and persistent due to the predictive climate change.

To better understand the dynamics of the relationship between soil and water-borne infectious diseases with climate and more importantly predict outcomes in the future, particularly in areas with potential emerging situations, we are proposing the development of an openly accessible computational tool that would be accessible to non-expert users, i.e. researchers and health professionals, and allow them to use available climate inputs and epidemiological information to facilitate analysis, prediction and visualization of data relevant to infectious disease studied, as a means of informing policies in disease management. 1.Baker, R.E., et al.

Infectious disease in an era of global change. Nat Rev Microbiol (2021).