What diseases are important in East Africa and likely to be affected?
Generally speaking, any disease which has a distribution or transmission affected by environmental variables has the potential to be affected by climate change; precipitation and temperature are likely to be the main, recognized, drivers of these changes. Under this umbrella fall big killers such as malaria and diarrheal diseases such as cholera and typhoid, as well as some of the “neglected tropical diseases”, such as schistosomiasis, soil-transmitted helminths, leishmaniasis and lymphatic filariasis. As well, the wider social effects of climate change could lead to changes in patterns of other disease transmission and distribution, such as HIV and TB, although this goes beyond the direct effects of climate change and thus the scope of this essay. Even without including these, the list of infectious diseases that may be affected by climate change is worryingly long, and each is defined by the particular characteristics of its mode of transmission, life cycle and environmental constrai
