Key result
Meteorological factors, such as absolute humidity, show seasonal variations closely parallel to the incidence of poliomyelitis, though these associations may lack a causal relationship.
Why the study?
Do meteorological factors influence the incidence of poliomyelitis?
Do meteorological factors influence the incidence of poliomyelitis?
The text discusses the potential association between meteorological factors like absolute humidity and the seasonal incidence of poliomyelitis, while cautioning against assuming causality from parallel trends.
Humidity-poliomyelitis parallels should not change practice; leaves open causal environmental roles for prospective study.
The seasonal variation in the incidence of polio-myelitis in temperate climates is one of the most obvious characteristics of the disease. A number of explanations of this have been put forward, for example by Aycock (1930), Petersen (1941), and Armstrong (1950). These explanations are mainly based on association in the average monthly trends and this approach is suspect statistically since it would almost always be possible to find some factor, meteorological or otherwise, with a similar seasonal distribution to poliomyelitis but with no necessary causal relation to the disease. Armstrong (1950), for example, shews that the seasonal variation in absolute humidity is closely parallel to that of poliomyelitis in eastern North America and goes on to produce an
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C. C. Spicer (1959) conducted a review in Poliomyelitis. Meteorological factors (e.g., absolute humidity) was evaluated on Incidence of poliomyelitis. Meteorological factors, such as absolute humidity, show seasonal variations closely parallel to the incidence of poliomyelitis, though these associations may lack a causal relationship.
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