Criteria for the prioritization of public health interventions for climate-sensitive vector-borne diseases in Quebec.

Abstract

Prioritizing resources for optimal responses to an ever growing list of existing and emerging infectious diseases represents an important challenge to public health. In the context of climate change, there is increasing anticipated variability in the occurrence of infectious diseases, notably climate-sensitive vector-borne diseases. An essential step in prioritizing efforts is to identify what considerations and concerns to take into account to guide decisions and thus set disease priorities. This study was designed to perform a comprehensive review of criteria for vector-borne disease prioritization, assess their applicability in a context of climate change with a diverse cross-section of stakeholders in order to produce a baseline list of considerations to use in this decision-making context. Differences in stakeholder choices were examined with regards to prioritization of these criteria for research, surveillance and disease prevention and control objectives. A preliminary list of criteria was identified following a review of the literature. Discussions with stakeholders were held to consolidate and validate this list of criteria and examine their effects on disease prioritization. After this validation phase, a total of 21 criteria were retained. A pilot vector-borne disease prioritization exercise was conducted using PROMETHEE to examine the effects of the retained criteria on prioritization in different intervention domains. Overall, concerns expressed by stakeholders for prioritization were well aligned with categories of criteria identified in previous prioritization studies. Weighting by category was consistent between stakeholders overall, though some significant differences were found between public health and non-public health stakeholders. From this exercise, a general model for climate-sensitive vector-borne disease prioritization has been developed that can be used as a starting point for further public health prioritization exercises relating to research, surveillance, and prevention and control interventions in a context of climate change. Multi-stakeholder engagement in prioritization can help broaden the range of criteria taken into account, offer opportunities for early identification of potential challenges and may facilitate acceptability of any resulting decisions.