A multi-factor malaria occurrence analysis in Sudan Interaction between climate, conflict, and health systems
(2026) In TVVR 5000 VVRM01 20261Division of Water Resources Engineering
- Abstract
- Malaria remains a major public health concern in Sudan, where transmission is influenced by climate variability, environmental conditions, population displacement, conflict, and disruptions to healthcare services. Using ERA5 climate data, a Climate Suitability Index (CSI) was developed to evaluate the climatic suitability for Plasmodium falciparum transmission in Sudan between 2000 and 2024. Annual state level and population-weighted national CSI were computed and compared with national malaria occurrence data from the World Health Organization. Further analyses were conducted to assess the relationships between malaria occurrence, flooding, displacement, and disruptions to the health systems. A humanitarian malaria reporting database... (More)
- Malaria remains a major public health concern in Sudan, where transmission is influenced by climate variability, environmental conditions, population displacement, conflict, and disruptions to healthcare services. Using ERA5 climate data, a Climate Suitability Index (CSI) was developed to evaluate the climatic suitability for Plasmodium falciparum transmission in Sudan between 2000 and 2024. Annual state level and population-weighted national CSI were computed and compared with national malaria occurrence data from the World Health Organization. Further analyses were conducted to assess the relationships between malaria occurrence, flooding, displacement, and disruptions to the health systems. A humanitarian malaria reporting database containing 273 Sudan specific reports from 2000 to 2024 was established from ReliefWeb reports to identify reported malaria drivers and interventions, and to support the quantitative analyses. The results suggested that the southern and southeast regions of Sudan exhibited consistently higher climatic suitability, while the hyper-arid northern regions exhibited lower suitability. CSI showed a stronger association with malaria occurrence when a one-year lag was considered, while flooding demonstrated a significant positive relationship with malaria occurrence in the same year. Humanitarian reporting database demonstrated the increasing impact of conflict, displacement, and disruptions to the health systems on malaria occurrence. The results support the integration of climate-based suitability monitoring with humanitarian and health system indicators to strengthen malaria preparedness, surveillance, and intervention planning in Sudan, while highlighting the need for improved availability and accessibility of subnational and long-term malaria occurrence data, longer-term health system capacity data, and state level displacement information to enable more robust analyses of the interactions between climate, conflict, displacement, and malaria occurrence. (Less)
- Popular Abstract
- More Than Climate: Understanding Malaria Occurrence in Sudan
Why do malaria outbreaks occur in some years but not others, even when the climate appears suitable for transmission? This question is becoming increasingly important in Sudan, where climate change, flooding, conflict, population displacement, and disruptions to healthcare services are occurring simultaneously.
Malaria remains one of the most important public health challenges in Sudan. Temperature, rainfall, and humidity influence the mosquitoes that transmit malaria, however climate alone does not determine where and when malaria occurs. Flooding can create mosquito breeding habitats, conflict can move people from their homes, and damaged healthcare systems can restrict... (More) - More Than Climate: Understanding Malaria Occurrence in Sudan
Why do malaria outbreaks occur in some years but not others, even when the climate appears suitable for transmission? This question is becoming increasingly important in Sudan, where climate change, flooding, conflict, population displacement, and disruptions to healthcare services are occurring simultaneously.
Malaria remains one of the most important public health challenges in Sudan. Temperature, rainfall, and humidity influence the mosquitoes that transmit malaria, however climate alone does not determine where and when malaria occurs. Flooding can create mosquito breeding habitats, conflict can move people from their homes, and damaged healthcare systems can restrict access to diagnosis and treatment. Improving malaria preparedness and response requires an understanding of how these variables interact.
This thesis combines climate, displacement, and health system data into a single analytical framework to investigate the occurrence of malaria in Sudan between 2000 and 2024. This thesis combines climate, displacement, and health system data into a single analytical framework to investigate the occurrence of malaria in Sudan between 2000 and 2024. To identify states where environmental conditions are favorable for the transmission of malaria, a climate suitability index was developed using temperature, rainfall, and humidity data. These results were compared with national malaria case, flood, displacement, and health system capacity data, and further qualitatively assessed with the information extracted from the 273 humanitarian reports.
The results showed that southern and southeastern Sudan consistently had the most favorable climatic conditions for malaria transmission, while the arid northern regions remained less suitable. Climate suitability was most strongly associated with malaria occurrence when a one-year delay was considered, indicating that favorable environmental conditions may influence transmission beyond the same year. Flooding was also linked to increased malaria occurrence and appeared to be an important environmental driver.
However, climate was only part of the issue. The increasing impact of conflict, displacement, and disruptions to healthcare services was emphasized in humanitarian reports and health system assessments. Disease patterns are more complicated than climate alone would imply because these factors can impact both the transmission of malaria and the capacity to detect and report cases.
The results show that rather than being solely a climatic issue, malaria risk in Sudan should be perceived as the result of interacting environmental and humanitarian factors. The thesis also identifies significant data gaps, including the lack of long-term subnational malaria, displacement, and health systems data. In Sudan and other countries facing similar humanitarian challenges, improved access to this data would facilitate more effective malaria control strategies. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
https://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/9240831
- author
- Pulluoglu, Sevinc Polen LU
- supervisor
-
- Erik Nilsson LU
- organization
- course
- VVRM01 20261
- year
- 2026
- type
- H2 - Master's Degree (Two Years)
- subject
- keywords
- Malaria, climate change, conflict, anopheles, plasmodium falciparum
- publication/series
- TVVR 5000
- report number
- TVVR26/5017
- ISSN
- 1101-9824
- language
- English
- additional info
- Examiner; Magnus Larson
- id
- 9240831
- date added to LUP
- 2026-06-18 09:27:35
- date last changed
- 2026-09-04 15:59:10
@misc{9240831,
abstract = {{Malaria remains a major public health concern in Sudan, where transmission is influenced by climate variability, environmental conditions, population displacement, conflict, and disruptions to healthcare services. Using ERA5 climate data, a Climate Suitability Index (CSI) was developed to evaluate the climatic suitability for Plasmodium falciparum transmission in Sudan between 2000 and 2024. Annual state level and population-weighted national CSI were computed and compared with national malaria occurrence data from the World Health Organization. Further analyses were conducted to assess the relationships between malaria occurrence, flooding, displacement, and disruptions to the health systems. A humanitarian malaria reporting database containing 273 Sudan specific reports from 2000 to 2024 was established from ReliefWeb reports to identify reported malaria drivers and interventions, and to support the quantitative analyses. The results suggested that the southern and southeast regions of Sudan exhibited consistently higher climatic suitability, while the hyper-arid northern regions exhibited lower suitability. CSI showed a stronger association with malaria occurrence when a one-year lag was considered, while flooding demonstrated a significant positive relationship with malaria occurrence in the same year. Humanitarian reporting database demonstrated the increasing impact of conflict, displacement, and disruptions to the health systems on malaria occurrence. The results support the integration of climate-based suitability monitoring with humanitarian and health system indicators to strengthen malaria preparedness, surveillance, and intervention planning in Sudan, while highlighting the need for improved availability and accessibility of subnational and long-term malaria occurrence data, longer-term health system capacity data, and state level displacement information to enable more robust analyses of the interactions between climate, conflict, displacement, and malaria occurrence.}},
author = {{Pulluoglu, Sevinc Polen}},
issn = {{1101-9824}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
series = {{TVVR 5000}},
title = {{A multi-factor malaria occurrence analysis in Sudan Interaction between climate, conflict, and health systems}},
year = {{2026}},
}