EFFECT OF HUMAN, LIVESTOCK POPULATION, CLIMATIC AND ENVIRONMENTAL FACTORS ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF BRUCELLOSIS IN SOUTHWEST IRAN

Introduction: Brucellosis is a zoonotic infectious disease that has been considered as an important public health problem. A geospatial information system (GIS) study was performed to investigate the effect of human, livestock population and ecological factors on the distribution of brucellosis in Kohgiluyeh & Boyerahmad (K-B) province, southwest Iran. Materials and methods: The dwelling addresses of 374 patients in a 5 years period were obtained from Provincial Health Center. The effect of livestock and human population and also the effect of geographical and climatic factors including: slope, elevation, land cover, mean annual rainfall, mean annual temperature, mean annual minimum temperature and mean annual maximum temperature were analyzed on human brucellosis distribution by GIS approach. Statistical analysis was performed using Mann-Whitney and chi-square tests. Results: Most of patients were from villages (68%). Density of human, sheep/goat and cow densities was positively associated with the occurrence of disease. Also, geo-climatic factors of elevation, slope and rainfall were negatively associated with the disease. Urban, irrigated and dry farm and thin rangeland areas were considered as the effective land covers on the brucellosis in the current study. Conclusion: These findings show the distribution of brucellosis in southwest Iran is influenced by combination of human population, livestock density and climatic and environmental factors. The direct results of this study can be used to substantially save the cost of health care and control programs in the province and the south west part of the country and would be useful in controlling of any possible outbreak in the future.