The short-term association between meteorological factors and mumps in Jining, China

An increasing trend of the incidence of mumps has been observed in a few developing countries in recent years, presenting a major threat to children's health. A few studies have examined the relationship between meteorological factors and mumps with inconsistent findings.

The daily data of meteorological variables and mumps from 2009 to 2013 were obtained from Jining, a temperate inland city of China. A generalized additive model was used to quantify the association between meteorological factors and mumps based on the exposure-response relationship.

A total of 8520 mumps cases were included in this study. We found a nonlinear relationship of daily mean temperature, sunshine duration and relative humidity with mumps, with an approximately linear association for mean temperature above 4°C (excess risk (ER) for 1°C increase was 2.72%, 95% confidence interval (CI): 2.38%, 3.05% on the current day), for relative humidity above 54%, the ER for 1% increase was -1.86% (95% CI: -2.06%, -1.65%) at lag day 14; and for sunshine duration higher than 5h/d, the ER for per 1h/d increase was12.91% (95% CI: 11.38%, 14.47%) at lag day 1. While we found linear effects for daily wind speed (ER: 2.98%, 95% CI: 2.71%, 3.26% at lag day 13).

This study suggests that meteorological factors might be important predictors of incidence of mumps, and should be considered in its control and prevention.