Acute Infection Following Flood Disaster: An Example From Bojonegoro District, East Java, Indonesia

On December 27, 2007, huge flood inundated Bojonegoro district, Indonesia. Our study aims were toinvestigate occurrence and risk factors of acute infections following the Bojonegoro flood. This surveywith multistage-cluster sampling studied 1016 flooded-household members, 1021 non-flooded members.Chi-square test and Cox multiple-regression model were used in the analysis. Half of flooded-householdmembers experienced acute infections within 1 month after flood, predominantly dermatitis (prevalencerate: 20.4%), acute respiratory tract infection (19.1%), gastroenteritis (10.7%) and dengue hemorrhagic fever(0.7%). The prevalence rates of these infections were higher than official rates before flood. Age, householdstatus, contact duration with flood water were significant risk factors of gastro-enteritis, while for acuterespiratory infection, number of household member, age, contact duration with floodwater, socio-economicstatus, displacement duration were the significant predictors. Environmental disruption, poor hygiene andsanitation, displacement and evacuation may increase the likelihood of spreading acute infections followingthe flood.