Shared Component Model for Childhood Anaemia, Diarrhoea, and Fever Comorbidities in Nigeria: A Geospatial Perspective

Abstract

Children under the age of five in Nigeria continue to experience significant comorbidities of diseases, contributing to high morbidity and mortality rates. This study applied a Bayesian shared component model to separate the specific and shared risk factors associated with anaemia, diarrhoea, and fever among children across the states in Nigeria. Regional climatic variations were integrated into the spatial modelling framework to enhance the analysis. Childhood disease data were sourced from the 2018 Nigeria Demographic and Health Survey. The identified risk factors common to the three health conditions are wealth index of household, maternal educational level, land surface tempera-ture and regional precipitation. Geospatial analysis of the posterior disease risk estimates revealed that the comorbidities of anae mia-diarrhoea, anaemia-fever, diarrhoea-fever, and anaemia-diarrhoea-fever are disproportionately higher in the northeastern and southern re-gions of the country. To significantly mitigate the risk of disease comorbidities, policymakers and health authorities in Nigeria should im-plement initiatives to address common risk factors, with priority given to the identified hotspot regions.