Ecological suitability of Yersinia pestes and spatial dynamics of plague in Qinghai Lake Region, China

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Emmanuel Temitope Arotolu and XiaoLong Wang, Center of Conservation Medicine and Ecological Safety, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, China, HaoNing Wang, School of Geography and Tourism, Harbin University, Harbin, China, Lv JiaNing, College of Wildlife and Protected Area, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, China, Shi Kun, Wildlife Institute, Beijing Forestry University, Beijing, China, Liya Huang, Changbai Mountain Academy of Sciences, Jilin, China

Background/Question/Methods Plague, a highly infectious disease caused by Yersinia pestis, has killed millions of people in history and is still active in the natural foci of the world nowadays. Understanding the spatiotemporal patterns of plague outbreaks in history is critically important, as it may help to facilitate prevention and controls for the potential future outbreaks. This study’s objective was to estimate the impact of topography, vegetation, climate and other environmental factors on the Yersinia pestis ecological niche. Plague occurrence data from 2004 – 2018 and environmental variables were spatially modeled by maximum entropy algorithm to evaluate the contribution of the variables to the distribution of the Yersinia pestis.
Results/Conclusions Our results found Average minimum temperature in September (2 ºC)and sheep population density (250 sheep per km2) influential in characterizing the niche. The rim of the Qinghai lake showed more favorable conditions for Yersinia pestis presence than other areas within the study area. The identification of various factors will assist in future modeling efforts and our suitability map provide hotspots which will assist public health officials in resources allocation in their quest to abate future plague outbreak.