Abstract
Leishmaniases are a group of tropical and neglected diseases caused by the protozoa of the genus Leishmania which are transmitted by insect sandflies. Despite of the major efforts undertaken at global level for the control of these diseases, a recent spreading to non-endemic areas been observed. In this study we analyzed the spatio-temporal distribution of Visceral Leishmaniasis (VL) and Tegumentary Leishmaniasis (TL) cases notified in a tropical region of Brazil. A retrospective evaluation was carried out using secondary data (e.g., demographics, origin, age and area of occurrence) of human patients obtained from 2009 to 2019. Choropleth maps with levels of color intensity represented the spatial distribution of VL and TL cases. Overall, 116 (10.5 ± 8.5) cases of leishmaniases were registered in the study area during the whole period. Of those, 61 (5.5 ± 5.5) and 55 (5 ± 4.3) were diagnosed as VL and TL, respectively. VL cases were recorded in 61.9% (13/21) and TL cases in 42.8% (9/21) of the municipalities. Most of the cases were predominantly notified in men from rural areas, and specifically for TL with an age range of 30–59 years old. These findings will be useful to drive strategies of control (e.g., vector control, dog surveillance and notification of suspected cases) against these neglect diseases, preventing the spreading to non-endemic areas.
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The datasets analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
This article is based on the Ph.D. thesis (Graduate Program in Animal Bioscience) of the first author, developed at the Federal Rural University of Pernambuco, and supported by a grant fellowship from the Coordination for the Improvement of Personnel of Higher Education (CAPES). R.A.N.R. receives a research fellowship from CNPq (Bolsa de Produtividade; Grant No. 305971/2021-2). Authors would like thank Maureen Kelly (Texas A&M University, United States) for her suggestions on the manuscript.
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All authors contributed to the study conception and design. Material preparation, data collection and analysis were performed by CRCUF, TARFL, LSSB, LCA, GAC and RANR. The first draft of the manuscript was written by CRCUF, AG and RANR and all authors commented on previous versions of the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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This study was performed with secondary data extracted from the System for Notifiable Diseases [Sistema de Informação de Agravos de Notificação (SINAN)] and provided with agreement from Health Surveillance of the V Regional Management of Health (written consent 03/2020). The identity of each human patient was not available by the V Regional Management of Health.
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Filho, C.R.C.U., Lima, T.A.R.F., de Barros, L.S.S. et al. Leishmaniases in a tropical area of Brazil: a spatio-temporal analysis. J Parasit Dis 47, 556–561 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12639-023-01600-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12639-023-01600-y