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The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China?
The Three Gorges Dam, located in the largest endemic area of schistosomiasis in China, is one of the world’s largest hydroelectric projects to date. Some large-scale hydro projects have resulted in schistosomiasis emergence or re-emergence. Therefore, the dam’s potential impact on the transmission o...
Autores principales: | , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2016
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4932735/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27377962 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40249-016-0156-3 |
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author | Zhou, Yi-Biao Liang, Song Chen, Yue Jiang, Qing-Wu |
author_facet | Zhou, Yi-Biao Liang, Song Chen, Yue Jiang, Qing-Wu |
author_sort | Zhou, Yi-Biao |
collection | PubMed |
description | The Three Gorges Dam, located in the largest endemic area of schistosomiasis in China, is one of the world’s largest hydroelectric projects to date. Some large-scale hydro projects have resulted in schistosomiasis emergence or re-emergence. Therefore, the dam’s potential impact on the transmission of Schistosoma japonicum has raised concerns from medical researchers worldwide. A systematic literature review, coupled with an analysis of data on the water level and snail density in the Yangtze River was conducted to assess the impact of the dam on schistosomiasis transmission after more than 10 years of operation. The dam has significantly altered the water levels in the Yangtze River according to different seasons. These changes directly impact the ecology of the schistosome snail host. Due to the dam, there has been a reduction in the density of Oncomelania snails and/or changes in the distribution of snails. The prevalence of infection with S. japonicum has decreased in the downstream areas of the dam, including in the Dongting and Poyang Lakes. The prevalence of infection with S. japonicum in humans has decreased from 6.80 % in 2002 (before the dam began operating) to 0.50 % in 2012, and the number of people infected with S. japonicum have decreased from 94 208 in 2002 to 59 200 in 2011 in the Poyang Lake region. The presence of the dam does not seem to affect snail breeding or the prevalence of schistosomiasis in the Three Gorges Reservoir. Overall, the Three Gorges Dam has significantly contributed to changes in hydrology after more than 10 years of the dam operating. The changes caused by the dam, together with integrated control of schistosomiasis, might be accelerating the progress towards eliminating the transmission of S. japonicum in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Despite the positive effect the dam is having in controlling S. japonicum transmission, continued surveillance is required to monitor the future ecological impacts of the dam over the long term. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s40249-016-0156-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4932735 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2016 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-49327352016-07-06 The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? Zhou, Yi-Biao Liang, Song Chen, Yue Jiang, Qing-Wu Infect Dis Poverty Scoping Review The Three Gorges Dam, located in the largest endemic area of schistosomiasis in China, is one of the world’s largest hydroelectric projects to date. Some large-scale hydro projects have resulted in schistosomiasis emergence or re-emergence. Therefore, the dam’s potential impact on the transmission of Schistosoma japonicum has raised concerns from medical researchers worldwide. A systematic literature review, coupled with an analysis of data on the water level and snail density in the Yangtze River was conducted to assess the impact of the dam on schistosomiasis transmission after more than 10 years of operation. The dam has significantly altered the water levels in the Yangtze River according to different seasons. These changes directly impact the ecology of the schistosome snail host. Due to the dam, there has been a reduction in the density of Oncomelania snails and/or changes in the distribution of snails. The prevalence of infection with S. japonicum has decreased in the downstream areas of the dam, including in the Dongting and Poyang Lakes. The prevalence of infection with S. japonicum in humans has decreased from 6.80 % in 2002 (before the dam began operating) to 0.50 % in 2012, and the number of people infected with S. japonicum have decreased from 94 208 in 2002 to 59 200 in 2011 in the Poyang Lake region. The presence of the dam does not seem to affect snail breeding or the prevalence of schistosomiasis in the Three Gorges Reservoir. Overall, the Three Gorges Dam has significantly contributed to changes in hydrology after more than 10 years of the dam operating. The changes caused by the dam, together with integrated control of schistosomiasis, might be accelerating the progress towards eliminating the transmission of S. japonicum in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze River. Despite the positive effect the dam is having in controlling S. japonicum transmission, continued surveillance is required to monitor the future ecological impacts of the dam over the long term. ELECTRONIC SUPPLEMENTARY MATERIAL: The online version of this article (doi:10.1186/s40249-016-0156-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. BioMed Central 2016-07-05 /pmc/articles/PMC4932735/ /pubmed/27377962 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40249-016-0156-3 Text en © The Author(s). 2016 Open AccessThis article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Scoping Review Zhou, Yi-Biao Liang, Song Chen, Yue Jiang, Qing-Wu The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title | The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title_full | The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title_fullStr | The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title_full_unstemmed | The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title_short | The Three Gorges Dam: Does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in China? |
title_sort | three gorges dam: does it accelerate or delay the progress towards eliminating transmission of schistosomiasis in china? |
topic | Scoping Review |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4932735/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27377962 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s40249-016-0156-3 |
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