The association of climatic pattern and leptospirosis cases in Malaysia from 2013 to 2021

Leptospirosis is an emerging infectious disease exemplified by frequent outbreaks worldwide with more than one million cases and 50,000 deaths annually. A high number of cases have been reported in Southeast Asia, including Malaysia. This study aims to identify the relationship between climatic patterns and leptospirosis cases in Malaysia from 2013 to 2021.

The climatic data comprising temperature, humidity, and rainfall from 2013 to 2021 were obtained from the Malaysian Meteorological Department. Data was collected from five states in Malaysia: Kelantan, Perak, Selangor, Negeri Sembilan, and Sarawak. A Spearman correlation test was used to determine the relationship between the climatic pattern and Leptospirosis cases.

In general, Leptospirosis cases fluctuated, with a maximum number of 8291 cases in 2015 and the lowest number being 1761 cases in 2021. The rainfall (mm) exhibited a fluctuating pattern from 2013 to 2021, with the highest total rainfall of 1938.5 mm in 2017. Temperature patterns varied from 2013 to 2021 with the highest temperature recorded was 27.60 degrees Celsius (°C) in 2016. The humidity increased steadily from 2017 to 2021, with the highest humidity recorded at 83.7% in 2020. A significant relationship was identified between the rainfall (mm) and Leptospirosis cases (p<0.05).

The findings imply that the amount of rainfall has a significant relationship with leptospirosis cases and the highest cases of leptospirosis of 8291 cases, occurred in the year 2015 with a temperature of 27.3°C, a humidity of 82.4 %, and a total rainfall of 1559.1mm.