Climate influences the transmission of many infectious diseases, some of which being among the most important causes of death and morbidity in developing countries. Commonly, these diseases occur as epidemics which may be triggered by variations in climatic conditions that imply higher transmission rates. Strengthening early surveillance and response systems (EWS) for climate sensitive health hazards becomes fundamental under conditions of rapid global environmental change, population movements, disease vectors and infections.

The WHO Climate Change and Health Unit is supporting countries to implement the Early Warning and Response System (EWARS), a predictive model developed by the University of Gothenburg in collaboration with the University of Umea and WHO Special Programme for Research and Training in Tropical Diseases (TDR). A web-based EWARS dashboard has been developed to use this model to predict outbreaks of dengue, chikungunya, zika, and in some cases, malaria and cholera. This is a user-friendly tool that can: (i) analyse and draw conclusions from historic dengue, chikungunya and Zika datasets (and is being piloted with cholera and malaria in some countries); (ii) identify appropriate alarm indicators that can sensitively and specifically predict forthcoming outbreaks at smaller spatial scales; and (iii) use these results and analyses to build an early warning system to detect outbreaks in real-time and respond accordingly. Several tools have been developed to support implement: