The Identification and Analysis of Indicators for Predicting Malarial Incidence in Zimbabwe

Abstract

With over 50% of the country's population at risk of contracting malaria despite the introduction of several measures to combat the disease, Zimbabwe is one of the eight countries in the Malaria Elimination 8 platform of the Southern African Development Community. Various indicators, including temperature, population distribution, land cover, and access to hospitals affect the incidence and spread of this disease. In this paper, we consider different such indicators and present our analysis of their interaction (e.g., how the Plasmodium falciparum Parasite Rate (PfPR) affects the sickle cell trait) and their effect on malaria incidence in Zimbabwe. We also discuss the results of our preliminary experiments on predictive analytics of malaria incidence based on the indicators we have considered.