Spatial Modeling of Anthrax Risk in India's Agro-Climatic Zones: A Future Perspective.

Abstract

Climate change is altering ecosystems, posing a risk of major impact for both human and animal health. Emerging zoonotic diseases, such as anthrax, are particularly vulnerable to changes in climate and biodiversity. anthrax, a classic zoonotic disease, disproportionately affects vulnerable pastoralist communities. This research assessed how changing climatic variables influence the geographical spread of anthrax outbreaks in the Indian condition, a region confronting rapid climate impacts. The study also compared the effect of climate variables with traditional factors like livestock population distribution and soil-moisture balance in determining anthrax risk. MaxEnt, a machine learning model which maximizes entropy of the probability distribution was used to predict anthrax suitability under Indian climatic conditions. The results identified climatic variables like rainfall, soil moisture, soil pH, temperature humidity index (THI), land surface temperature (LST) and livestock density are critical in modeling anthrax suitability. These outcomes emphasize the key role of warming climatic events driven by raising temperature and more frequent and intense extreme weather events heatwaves, droughts and floods in shaping anthrax ecology in India. Further indicate that strategies targeting conserving megafauna diversity in agriculture ecosystems and enhancing livestock health in small and medium-sized herds could mitigate the disease's risks. This study underscores the growing significance of climate in anthrax distribution and suggests that biodiversity conservation and better livestock management could play key roles in reducing future anthrax incidences.