The effect of climate change on malaria distribution: A systematic literature review of empirical studies

Abstract

Given that malaria poses a great economic and health threat to African countries in particular, it was imperative to analyse the current empirical literature regarding the relation between malaria distribution and climate change for policy makers and anyone affected by this. Before analysing the effects of climate change on the distribution of malaria, we started this systematic literature review by breaking climate change down into four major parts, namely temperature, precipitation, geographical features, and large-scale climate phenomena. We analysed the effects of these variables on the prevalence of malaria to understand what drives mosquito population growth and malaria incidence rate. We found that these variables had a significant effect on mosquito population dynamics and the prevalence of malaria. After the four variables, the distribution of malaria was discussed to provide a clear picture of the current distribution of malaria in the African continent. The overwhelming majority of malaria burden is currently concentrated in Sub-Saharan Africa. North and South Africa presented the lowest number of malaria cases, in contrast to East, West and Central Africa, where malaria has a strong impact and presence. We found that malaria endemic areas provided suitable climatic environments for mosquito and malaria development. Our systematic literature review highlights the importance of climate change in the distribution of malaria. Our results were in line with related research, giving us confident in our conclusion.