RESEARCH ARTICLE
The Changing Epidemiology of Coccidioidomycosis in Los Angeles (LA) County, California, 1973–2011 Ramon E. Guevara1☯*, Tasneem Motala2☯, Dawn Terashita2☯ 1 Emergency Preparedness and Response Program, Department of Public Health, County of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States of America, 2 Acute Communicable Disease Control Program, Department of Public Health, County of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States of America ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. * [email protected]
Abstract
OPEN ACCESS Citation: Guevara RE, Motala T, Terashita D (2015) The Changing Epidemiology of Coccidioidomycosis in Los Angeles (LA) County, California, 1973–2011. PLoS ONE 10(8): e0136753. doi:10.1371/journal. pone.0136753 Editor: Vishnu Chaturvedi, California Department of Public Health, UNITED STATES Received: February 23, 2015 Accepted: August 7, 2015 Published: August 27, 2015 Copyright: © 2015 Guevara et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Coccidioidomycosis, also known as Valley Fever, is often thought of as an endemic disease of central California exclusive of Los Angeles County. The fungus that causes Valley Fever, Coccidioides spp., grows in previously undisturbed soil of semi-arid and arid environments of certain areas of the Americas. LA County has a few large areas with such environments, particularly the Antelope Valley which has been having substantial land development. Coccidioidomycosis that is both clinically- and laboratory-confirmed is a mandated reportable disease in LA County. Population surveillance data for 1973–2011 reveals an annual rate increase from 0.87 to 3.2 cases per 100,000 population (n = 61 to 306 annual cases). In 2004, case frequency started substantially increasing with notable epidemiologic changes such as a rising 2.1 to 5.7 male-to-female case ratio stabilizing to 1.4–2.2. Additionally, new building construction in Antelope Valley greatly rose in 2003 and displayed a strong correlation (R = 0.92, Pearson p
The Changing Epidemiology of Coccidioidomycosis in Los Angeles (LA) County, California, 1973–2011 Ramon E. Guevara1☯*, Tasneem Motala2☯, Dawn Terashita2☯ 1 Emergency Preparedness and Response Program, Department of Public Health, County of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States of America, 2 Acute Communicable Disease Control Program, Department of Public Health, County of Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California, United States of America ☯ These authors contributed equally to this work. * [email protected]
Abstract
OPEN ACCESS Citation: Guevara RE, Motala T, Terashita D (2015) The Changing Epidemiology of Coccidioidomycosis in Los Angeles (LA) County, California, 1973–2011. PLoS ONE 10(8): e0136753. doi:10.1371/journal. pone.0136753 Editor: Vishnu Chaturvedi, California Department of Public Health, UNITED STATES Received: February 23, 2015 Accepted: August 7, 2015 Published: August 27, 2015 Copyright: © 2015 Guevara et al. This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Coccidioidomycosis, also known as Valley Fever, is often thought of as an endemic disease of central California exclusive of Los Angeles County. The fungus that causes Valley Fever, Coccidioides spp., grows in previously undisturbed soil of semi-arid and arid environments of certain areas of the Americas. LA County has a few large areas with such environments, particularly the Antelope Valley which has been having substantial land development. Coccidioidomycosis that is both clinically- and laboratory-confirmed is a mandated reportable disease in LA County. Population surveillance data for 1973–2011 reveals an annual rate increase from 0.87 to 3.2 cases per 100,000 population (n = 61 to 306 annual cases). In 2004, case frequency started substantially increasing with notable epidemiologic changes such as a rising 2.1 to 5.7 male-to-female case ratio stabilizing to 1.4–2.2. Additionally, new building construction in Antelope Valley greatly rose in 2003 and displayed a strong correlation (R = 0.92, Pearson p
