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Publication Details
AFRICAN RESEARCH NEXUS
SHINING A SPOTLIGHT ON AFRICAN RESEARCH
agricultural and biological sciences
The relative contribution of co-infection to focal infection risk in children
Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences, Volume 280, No. 1754, Article 20122813, Year 2013
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Description
Co-infection is ubiquitous in people in the developing world but little is known regarding the potential for one parasite to act as a risk factor for another. Using generalized linear mixed modelling approaches applied to data from school-aged children from Zanzibar, Tanzania, we determined the strength of association between four focal infections (i.e. Ascaris lumbricoides, Trichuris trichiura, hookworm and self-reported fever, the latter used as a proxy for viral, bacterial or protozoal infections) and the prevalence or intensity of each of the helminth infections. We compared these potential co-infections with additional risk factors, specifically, host sex and age, socioeconomic status and physical environment, and determined what the relative contribution of each risk factor was. We found that the risk of infection with all four focal infections was strongly associated with at least one other infection, and that this was frequently dependent on the intensity of that other infection. In comparison, no other incorporated risk factor was associated with all focal infections. Successful control of infectious diseases requires identification of infection risk factors. This study demonstrates that co-infection is likely to be one of these principal risk factors and should therefore be given greater consideration when designing disease-control strategies. Future work should also incorporate other potential risk factors, including host genetics which were not available in this study and, ideally, assess the risks via experimental manipulation. © 2013 The Author(s) Published by the Royal Society. All rights reserved.
Authors & Co-Authors
Lello, Joanne
United Kingdom, Cardiff
College of Biomedical and Life Sciences
Knopp, Stefanie
Switzerland, Allschwil
Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute Swiss Tph
Switzerland, Basel
Universitat Basel
Mohammed, Khalfan Abdallah
Tanzania, Dar es Salaam
Ministry of Health and Social Welfare Dar es Salaam
Simba Khamis, I.
Tanzania, Dar es Salaam
Ministry of Health and Social Welfare Dar es Salaam
Utzinger, Jürg
Switzerland, Allschwil
Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute Swiss Tph
Switzerland, Basel
Universitat Basel
Viney, Mark E.
United Kingdom, Bristol
University of Bristol
Statistics
Citations: 27
Authors: 6
Affiliations: 5
Identifiers
Doi:
10.1098/rspb.2012.2813
ISSN:
09628452
e-ISSN:
14712954
Research Areas
Genetics And Genomics
Maternal And Child Health
Study Design
Cross Sectional Study
Study Locations
Tanzania