Skip to main content

ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Public Health
Sec. Infectious Diseases: Epidemiology and Prevention
Volume 13 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpubh.2025.1509495
This article is part of the Research Topic Women in Science: Infectious Diseases: Epidemiology and Prevention 2023 View all 21 articles

Epidemiology and spatiotemporal analysis of acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis in Zhejiang province, China, during 2004-2023

Provisionally accepted
Wanwan Sun Wanwan Sun Yijuan Chen Yijuan Chen Shuwen Qin Shuwen Qin Ziping Miao Ziping Miao *
  • Zhejiang Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Zhejiang CDC), Hangzhou, China

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis (AHC) has become a significant public health issue in Zhejiang province. However, the analysis of epidemiological characteristics and spatio-temporal patterns of AHC in Zhejiang province has not been studied yet.Monthly cases of AHC from 2004-2023 reported at the county level in Zhejiang province were obtained from the China Information System for Disease Control and Prevention. Demographic feature, yearly county incidence, global spatial autocorrelation, local spatial autocorrelation analyses, temporal and space-time cluster analysis were performed to identify and visualize the spatiotemporal patterns of AHC cases in Zhejiang province. The epidemiological characteristics of AHC outbreaks in the same period in Zhejiang province were also compared.A total of 52119 AHC cases were reported in Zhejiang province, resulting in an average incidence of 5.37 per 100000. No death cases occurred. The average age of all cases is 25.44±4.37 years old, 16.70% individuals aged between 10-19 years old, August to October was the seasonal peak months in each year; students, farmers were high incidence people. A significant positive spatial correlation of AHC in Zhejiang province was observed in year 2007 (Moran's I=0.095, p=0.039), 2009 (Moran's I=0.075, p=0.031) and 2011 (Moran's I=0.173, p=0.034), indicating spatial aggregation. Spatiotemporal scanning detected one cluster1 and one cluster 2 aggregation areas, with the cluster1 aggregation area (RR=21.44, P<0.001) locating in northeastern Zhejiang province, comprising 30 counties, and an aggregation time from 1 September 2010 to 30 September 2010. Compared to low-risk regions, proportion of cases of male, farmer, and older residents in high-risk counties were different. The symptoms of the affected students in outbreaks were mainly conjunctival congestion, increased eye secretions, eye swelling, eye pain, photophobia and tearing, and the proportion of fever was relatively low.Results in this study demonstrate a spatiotemporal heterogeneity of AHC cases in Zhejiang province, and provide the evidence in taking prevention and control measures against transmission and the occurrence of AHC in high-risk regions.

    Keywords: Acute hemorrhagic conjunctivitis (AHC), spatiotemporal analysis, Epidemiology, clustering, outbreak

    Received: 11 Oct 2024; Accepted: 13 Jan 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Sun, Chen, Qin and Miao. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Ziping Miao, Zhejiang Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Zhejiang CDC), Hangzhou, China

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.