Mapping childhood illness: Understanding the distribution of common symptoms in children under five in Africa, 2000 – 2015

Abstract

After twenty years as the World Health Organization’s premier strategy for improving childhood health, the Integrated Management of Neonatal and Childhood Illness (IMNCI) strategy is in the midst of an update. Increasing emphasis has been placed on the use of equity and mapping analyses to target implementation and adjust programs to local epidemiology. Our study interacts with these policy movements by producing geostatistical maps of the period prevalence of common symptoms of the childhood illnesses identified by the IMNCI guidelines. Specifically, we use Bayesian model-based geostatistics to create yearly maps of cough, diarrhea, fever, and their comorbidity in Africa from 2000 – 2015 at a 5x5 km2 resolution. These maps reveal uneven progress in the reduction of prevalence of these symptoms since the new millennium-- both between and within countries. The maps highlight areas where intervention should be focused and provide a high-level description of the underlying epidemiology. We expect that these geospatial products will allow policymakers to deploy interventions that are spatially and epidemiologically targeted to reduce the burden of childhood illness.