The 2023 fatal dengue outbreak in Bangladesh highlights a paradigm shift of geographical distribution of cases
Epidemiology and Infection·
- DOI
- 10.1017/s0950268824001791
- PMID
- 39763239
- PMCID
- PMC11704938
- OpenAlex
- W4406130015
- Study type
- Journal article
- Publisher
- Cambridge University Press (CUP)
- Article type
- journal-article
- Integrity
- current
Why this research matters now
The findings document a geographic paradigm shift in dengue transmission within Bangladesh, with the largest and deadliest outbreak on record demonstrating spread beyond the capital and early in-hospital mortality. Festival-related travel, meteorological factors, and urbanization likely contributed to the changed distribution.
Structured evidence summary
Research question
The study aimed to characterize the geographical transmission of dengue virus in Bangladesh during the 2023 outbreak.
Study design
The authors extracted and analyzed daily surveillance data on dengue cases and deaths from the national Management Information System covering the period January 1 through December 31, 2023. A generalized linear mixed model was used to identify associations between division-level daily dengue counts and geographical and meteorological covariates.
Population and setting
The study covered all administrative divisions of Bangladesh. Historically, most dengue cases were recorded in the capital city, Dhaka, but the 2023 outbreak showed a shift in geographical distribution.
Main findings
The 2023 outbreak recorded 321,179 cases—1.3 times the total from the preceding 23 years—and 1,705 deaths, double the historical cumulative fatality count. Divisions south of Dhaka reported a significantly higher incidence per 1,000 population compared to northern divisions (2.30 versus 0.50). Two-thirds of the 2023 deaths occurred within one day of hospital admission.
Public-health relevance
The findings document a geographic paradigm shift in dengue transmission within Bangladesh, with the largest and deadliest outbreak on record demonstrating spread beyond the capital and early in-hospital mortality. Festival-related travel, meteorological factors, and urbanization likely contributed to the changed distribution.
Important limitations
This summary is limited to the supplied single-article abstract and metadata. Assessment of surveillance system sensitivity, case definitions, diagnostic confirmation rates, and detailed model assumptions requires the original paper for decision-grade interpretation.
GIDS interpretation
The classifier links indicate that this peer-reviewed journal article is discoverable under dengue, outbreak investigation, transmission dynamics, travel medicine, and Bangladesh. These tags support retrieval in disease-specific and geographic surveillance contexts but do not imply validation of the findings by external surveillance systems.
Related GIDS surveillance
Literature context does not validate, explain, or change a surveillance signal. Exact and contextual relationships are shown separately.
Evidence relationships
This article has 11 auditable classifier relationships to diseases, places, topics, and study design.