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Zombie Infections and Other Infectious Disease Complications of Global Warming

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Zombie Infections and Other Infectious Disease Complications of Global Warming Zombie infections and other infectious disease complications of Global WarminG Joseph M. Kontra, M.D. LG Health Physicians Infectious Diseases “Earth is not a platform for human life. It’s a living being. frozen soil, and Bacillus anthracis was easily cultivated “We’re not on it but part of it. Its health is our health.” from newly thawed carcasses as well as the newly sick- ened animals. —Thomas Moore* A regional alarm was sounded when a 12-year-old Nenet boy died of anthrax, at least 90 more deer herd- INTRODUCTION ers were sickened, and more than 20 were hospitalized. In far northern Siberia lies a massive subdivision A state of emergency was declared, and the specter of called the Yamalo-Nenets, a permafrost region that Russian public health officials in yellow Hazmat garb extends well north of the Arctic Circle. The Nenets and quarantine tents appeared in international news (which means “man” in the native language) are the feeds. Hundreds of Nenets were evacuated. Veterinary nomadic inhabitants of the region, and “Yamal,” teams restarted a massive anthrax immunization pro- loosely translated, means the “end of the world.” The gram for the regional herd, which had been halted Nenets are sustained by the local reindeer population, over a decade ago due to lack of reported disease. By estimated to be the largest herd in the world, and late 2016, Russian officials considered culling 250,000 reindeer are sacred to the people of the region. From reindeer to try to halt the epidemic. reindeer the people derive food, clothing, and tools, In the even further northern reaches of the and they use the thick hides to form shelters. Nenet Siberian tundra lies the town of Zashiversk, still under herders travel up to 1,000 km with the reindeer herds permafrost. There, 150 years ago, a massive outbreak annually along ancient migration routes.1 of smallpox killed 40 percent of the region’s popula- The climate in Yamalo-Nenets is brutal. tion. Could the frozen corpses in shallow wooden Historically, winter temperatures reach –50°C, and graves serve as a source for the future reappearance summertime temperatures in the southern regions only of smallpox, a disease officially declared eradicated in briefly reach 15°C (59°F). However, climatologists indi- 1977? 3 cate that Russia is warming at 2.5 times the rate of the To investigate this possibility, wooden graves world average. In July 2016 the Yamalo-Nenets region from the 1840s were unearthed, and samples from experienced a heat wave that was unprecedented in frozen corpses were examined. While fragments of both magnitude and duration. Temperatures reached the smallpox virus genome were recovered by Russian a peak of 95°F, and they persisted above 80°F for many and French researchers, to date no viable transmissible weeks. The result was a rapid thawing of many thou- smallpox virus has been identified in frozen human sands of square miles of frozen tundra.2 remains.4 As decades-old reindeer carcasses thawed, These rare reports of so-called “zombie Infections,” microbes that had been frozen and well-preserved were admittedly hyperbolic, nonetheless highlight a stark released, and a disease that had not been seen in the reality: that changing climate and infectious diseases region since 1941 was resurrected. What followed was have always been linked. a massive outbreak of reindeer anthrax, which killed an estimated 2,300 reindeer in only a few weeks, as GLOBAL WARMING AND CLIMATE CHANGE affected animals died within only two to three days. The knowledge that climatic conditions The spore form of anthrax can survive indefinitely in affect human illness is centuries old. The Roman * American spiritual writer, b. 1940 12 The Journal of Lancaster General Hospital • Spring 2017 • Vol. 12 – No. 1 Zombie infections and other infectious disease complications Fig. 1. Line plot of global mean land-ocean surface temperature index, 1880 to present, with the base period 1951-1980. The dark blue line is the annual mean and the gold line is the five-year running mean. [This is an update of Fig. 1A in Hansen et al. (2006).] The graph shows an overall long- term warming trend. (NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies — http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/) aristocracy took their summers at higher cooler eleva- for the microbes themselves, but for the insect and tions in part to avoid seasonal outbreaks of malaria animal vectors that participate in the chain of trans- (“bad air”). The food processes of salting, smoking, mission of zoonotic infections.6 and currying of meats began in temperate climates due to an understanding of the association between Extreme Weather Events: ENSO food spoilage and diarrheal disease. One of the most significantly disruptive climate Climate change in the modern world is the events caused by global warming is the perturbation result of accumulating greenhouse gases, mainly in the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO), which carbon dioxide and methane, and the resultant trap- results in extreme weather events over a wide area. ping of reflected infrared radiation from the earth’s Climatic cycles of El Niño (sea surface temperatures surface. As a result of the increasing concentration in the eastern Pacific Ocean that are above average) of greenhouse gases, the global mean temperature and La Niña (below average sea surface temperatures is rising and the trend is accelerating (Fig. 1). The in the central and eastern Pacific Ocean), strongly Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) affect regional temperatures and rainfall. Variations predicts an average increase of 1.8°C to 5.8°C across in the amplitude, duration, and distribution of the globe by the end of the 21st century.5 Changes in ENSO events can lead to major, sometimes mas- ambient temperature can affect both the geographic sive and disruptive, heat wave-drought-flood cycles. range of pathogens as well as the incidence and sea- More extreme variations in weather conditions, sonal prevalence of disease. This holds true not only including severe storms as well as more frequent and The Journal of Lancaster General Hospital • Spring 2017 • Vol. 12 – No. 1 13 Zombie infections and other infectious disease complications non-seasonal hurricanes and typhoons, are conse- temperatures can allow for the survival of patho- quences of global warming as well. The resulting gens in previously hostile environments. Ambient effects on health and disease, especially in impov- warming can also result in a shortened pathogen erished regions with poor water, sanitation, and incubation period, and an increase in microbe den- health care infrastructure can be devastating.7 sity within the vector.12 Increasing temperatures, humidity, rainfall, and flooding also favor vec- Infections Associated with Extreme Weather Events tor breeding, while shortening their life cycle and Tropical storms and hurricanes in Central expanding their habitat range. America and across the southern United States Arthropod-borne diseases are perhaps the most have increased substantially over the last 20 years, notable infectious diseases to be affected by global with attendant increases in weather-related deaths warming. These burgeoning epidemics have been and massive socio-economic disruption.8 Increased particularly facilitated by the unrelenting expansion rates of fecal-oral gastrointestinal infections, vector- of the range of Aedes aegypti, the critically impor- borne illnesses, skin and soft tissue infections, and tant mosquito vector for multiple viral pathogens. respiratory infections have all been associated with Its geographic range is heavily influenced by varia- such disasters. Flood-related outbreaks of bacterial tions in temperature, humidity, and precipitation diseases that have been identified include typhoid that result from the weather pattern disruptions of fever, cholera, shigellosis, enteropathogenic E. coli, global warming. In only the last few years its range non-typhoidal salmonella, and leptospirosis. The has expanded from the Mexican border up to San risk of fecal-oral viral infections such as hepatitis Francisco on the west coast and Pennsylvania on the A and E is also increased in association with rainy east coast.13 season floods. Parasitic diseases such as Giardia Dengue and chikungunya are arboviruses that pro- and Cryptosporidium are also consequences of the duce acute febrile illnesses associated with severe flooding that results from these extreme weather musculoskeletal pain (Dengue is known by locals in perturbations. endemic areas as “break bone fever”). While not as Further, displaced and crowded populations are newsworthy in the United States as zika virus, about also at risk for outbreaks of measles, meningococ- one third of the world’s population lives in dengue cal meningitis, influenza, and MRSA infection.9 A endemic areas, with over 400 million infections esti- detailed study in Peru compared health care data mated to occur annually.14 after a severe El Niño season with baseline data. For The intercontinental spread of these diseases each 1°C increase in temperature, hospital admis- has in part been attributed to increased ambient sions increased by 8 percent. Diarrheal disease temperatures and the increase in water breeding admissions predominated, and increased by over habitats that accompany more prolonged and persis- 6,200 cases post-El Niño.10 tent rainy seasons related to El Niño.15 Even drought conditions can be associated with Chikungunya virus, which had been endemic in an increase in infectious diseases. Under arid con- Asia and Africa for decades, spread suddenly and ditions where water sources are scarce, mosquitoes dramatically from India to the Americas in late and birds can be brought into proximity, facilitating 2013, causing an explosive epidemic. It is now esti- transmission of West Nile virus to birds, and then mated to be responsible for 1.7 million cases in 45 to humans. In addition, the poor sanitation that can countries.16 Though chikungunya is less lethal than accompany drought conditions can facilitate trans- dengue, its debilitating post-infectious musculoskel- mission of enteric infections, as was demonstrated etal pain can last for months.
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