Evaluating the impacts of environmental factors and compliance with health guidelines on the rate and trend in Covid-19 infection in Alborz province, 2019

Abstract

Background and Objective: In this research, considering the importance of the adverse effects of the Covid-19 disease and identifying the environmental factors involved in its outbreak, the effects of environmental factors and compliance with health guidelines on outbreak and mortality of Covid-19 have been evaluated. Materials and Methods: This research was a descriptive-analytical study on confirmed patients with Covid-19 in Alborz province in 2019. In this study, outbreak rate and death due to Covid-19, compliance with health guidelines, air pollutants concentrations, air pollution indicators, and the meteorological conditions of Alborz province were daily collected for 2019. All data were analyzed in IBM SPSS Statistics v26 software with Pearson, Spearman, Kruskal-Wallis, one-way variance ANOVA analysis tests, and negative binomial regression statistical models. Results: The results of the regression model showed that in the mortality rate due to Covid-19, the variables of average temperature(p=0.042), humidity(p=0.048), rate of Covid-19 infection(p=0.001), and compliance with health guidelines(p=0.007) are significant. However, in the model of the rate of infection with Covid-19, only compliance with health guidelines(p=0.001) was significant. Pearson's and Spearman's correlation coefficients for infection rate, compliance with health guidelines, wind speed, and concentrations of carbon monoxide, PM2.5, and SO2 with the death rate due to corona, were 0.575, -0.411, -0.206, 0.211, 0.114 and -0.158. Conclusion: The results showed that in addition to compliance with health guidelines, some atmospheric factors and air pollutants also impact the rate of infection and mortality caused by Covid-19.

Keywords

• covid-19
• mortality
• infection rate
• health guidelines
• environmental factors