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

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 anaemia-‎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.