PONE-D-24-09817

Informing climate-health adaptation options through mapping the needs and potential for integrated climate-driven early warning forecasting systems in South Asia

PLOS ONE

Dear Dr. Asaaga,

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PLOS ONE

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Additional Editor Comments:

Reviewer 1

Several methodological issues that need to be addressed before considering it for publication.

Please, find here my comments and suggestions.

The abstract is quite verbose, especially for the results section. In this regard, my suggestion is to retrieve and summarize the main data from the corresponding section of the main text.

There is a slight misperception about what constitutes an emerging disease versus simply an outbreak of a non-emerging disease. My suggestion is that someone with some experience in infectious diseases, their transmission, and potential vectors (which can also be influenced by climate), reviews the text.

I don't understand why the work is limited to South Asia; perhaps the introduction should better explain the rationale.

Lines 131-133 could be removed.

Line 156. The methodology used for this additional research (or second stage of research, as the authors prefer to identify it) is not very clear. Were free searches used? Keywords? Clarification would be helpful.

Line 276, the name of journal in which the articles included in the review are published is not relevant information. Moreover, it is also excluded from the classical methodology for conducting systematic and scoping reviews.

Figure 2 is only partially informative.

The authors should replace it with a table summarizing the "typical" characteristics of studies included in systematic reviews: first author, year of publication, country, study design, main findings, possible bias, funding, and quality of that evidence.

Additionally, for this last point, I do not see the choice of a specific tool for assessing the quality of that evidence. It is important to remember that a systematic review may be undertaken to confirm or refute whether current practice is based on relevant evidence, to establish the quality of that evidence, and to address any uncertainty or variation in practice that may be occurring.

Reviewer 2

I suggest authors mention the type of study (ie., scoping review) in the title of the article.

Introduction

I suggest verifying the correct use of the term “hazard” (eg., lines 53, 56) by consulting the report summarising extensive work on terminology and definitions carried out by the DRR scientific community (https://www.undrr.org/publication/hazard-definition-and-classification-review-technical-report).

Methods

I cannot find Page et al., 2020 (line 138) in the reference list at the bottom of the manuscript. In this regard, I would suggest considering/citing the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist.

I don’t think it is necessary to include a table with your search strings in the methods, it can go in the Supporting information, Appendix.

In section 2.2 I would have appreciated reading a few lines about your operational definitions of core concepts. This helps understanding how you applied eligibility criteria and enhances replicability of your protocol.

Text in lines 185-187 and the PRISMA flowchart are better suited to the Results section.

Results & Discussion

Overall, authors have clearly reported and critically reflected upon results, and I was pleased to see integration of findings from scientific articles and policy documents.

I believe that in Section 3.3 there is again confusion regarding terminology, as some of the so-called hazards (eg., extreme weather events) are referred to as climate drivers. I am aware that there might be vocabulary-related discrepancies between the climate science community and the disaster science community. Perhaps, for the sake of clarity, it would be good to cite sources of definitions. Reporting operational definitions in the methods, as suggested above, might help.

I was wondering whether “national/state level health surveillance or information systems” (lines 476-477) is limited to systems and mechanisms implemented by the state, or whether you adopted a broader definition of health system that also included non-state actors such as international humanitarian organization, possibly relevant for countries like Afghanistan. Perhaps a reference to this issue might be of interest in section 3.4?

General comments

I believe only considering articles - esp. local policies - written in English is a very important limitation. If it is not possible to include documentation written in the local languages, I would advise specifying where possible the number of records that were excluded for language reasons and in any case to reflect on possible selection bias, and implications, in the results/discussion.

[Note: HTML markup is below. Please do not edit.]

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: No

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Dear authors,

I appreciated reading your manuscript titled: “Informing climate-health adaptation options through mapping the needs and potential for integrated climate-driven early warning forecasting systems in South Asia”. Please, find some suggestions below on how to improve the manuscript for publication in PLOS One.

Title & Abstract

I suggest authors mention the type of study (ie., scoping review) in the title of the article.

Introduction

I suggest verifying the correct use of the term “hazard” (eg., lines 53, 56) by consulting the report summarising extensive work on terminology and definitions carried out by the DRR scientific community (https://www.undrr.org/publication/hazard-definition-and-classification-review-technical-report).

Methods

I cannot find Page et al., 2020 (line 138) in the reference list at the bottom of the manuscript. In this regard, I would suggest considering/citing the PRISMA Extension for Scoping Reviews (PRISMA-ScR) checklist.

I don’t think it is necessary to include a table with your search strings in the methods, it can go in the Supporting information, Appendix.

In section 2.2 I would have appreciated reading a few lines about your operational definitions of core concepts. This helps understanding how you applied eligibility criteria and enhances replicability of your protocol.

Text in lines 185-187 and the PRISMA flowchart are better suited to the Results section.

Results & Discussion

Overall, authors have clearly reported and critically reflected upon results, and I was pleased to see integration of findings from scientific articles and policy documents.

I believe that in Section 3.3 there is again confusion regarding terminology, as some of the so-called hazards (eg., extreme weather events) are referred to as climate drivers. I am aware that there might be vocabulary-related discrepancies between the climate science community and the disaster science community. Perhaps, for the sake of clarity, it would be good to cite sources of definitions. Reporting operational definitions in the methods, as suggested above, might help.

I was wondering whether “national/state level health surveillance or information systems” (lines 476-477) is limited to systems and mechanisms implemented by the state, or whether you adopted a broader definition of health system that also included non-state actors such as international humanitarian organization, possibly relevant for countries like Afghanistan. Perhaps a reference to this issue might be of interest in section 3.4?

General comments

I believe only considering articles - esp. local policies - written in English is a very important limitation. If it is not possible to include documentation written in the local languages, I would advise specifying where possible the number of records that were excluded for language reasons and in any case to reflect on possible selection bias, and implications, in the results/discussion.

Reviewer #2: I want to thank the Editor for the opportunity of reading and reviewing the work by Asaaga and coll, titled “Informing climate-health adaptation options through mapping the needs and potential for integrated climate-driven early warning forecasting systems in South Asia”. The aim of this scoping review was to delineate and outline priority climate- and water-sensitive diseases, assess existing forecasting and surveillance systems within climate and health sectors, and explore the requirements and opportunities for developing integrated climate-driven early warning forecasting systems to aid long-term adaptation planning and interventions in the South Asia region.

Overall, the work is well written, but contains several methodological issues that need to be addressed before considering it for publication.

Please, find here my comments and suggestions.

The abstract is quite verbose, especially for the results section. In this regard, my suggestion is to retrieve and summarize the main data from the corresponding section of the main text.

There is a slight misperception about what constitutes an emerging disease versus simply an outbreak of a non-emerging disease. My suggestion is that someone with some experience in infectious diseases, their transmission, and potential vectors (which can also be influenced by climate), reviews the text.

I don't understand why the work is limited to South Asia; perhaps the introduction should better explain the rationale.

Lines 131-133 could be removed.

Line 156. The methodology used for this additional research (or second stage of research, as the authors prefer to identify it) is not very clear. Were free searches used? Keywords? Clarification would be helpful.

Line 276, the name of journal in which the articles included in the review are published is not relevant information. Moreover, it is also excluded from the classical methodology for conducting systematic and scoping reviews.

Figure 2 is only partially informative.

The authors should replace it with a table summarizing the "typical" characteristics of studies included in systematic reviews: first author, year of publication, country, study design, main findings, possible bias, funding, and quality of that evidence.

Additionally, for this last point, I do not see the choice of a specific tool for assessing the quality of that evidence. It is important to remember that a systematic review may be undertaken to confirm or refute whether current practice is based on relevant evidence, to establish the quality of that evidence, and to address any uncertainty or variation in practice that may be occurring.

**********

6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

Reviewer #2: No

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Informing climate-health adaptation options through mapping the needs and potential for integrated climate-driven early warning forecasting systems in South Asia – a scoping review

PONE-D-24-09817R1

Dear Dr. Asaaga,

We’re pleased to inform you that your manuscript has been judged scientifically suitable for publication and will be formally accepted for publication once it meets all outstanding technical requirements.

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Kind regards,

Md Nazirul Islam Sarker, PhD

Academic Editor

PLOS ONE

Additional Editor Comments (optional):

The author is advised to stay in contact with the production team for the next steps in the publication process.

Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: All comments have been addressed

Reviewer #2: All comments have been addressed

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2. Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions?

The manuscript must describe a technically sound piece of scientific research with data that supports the conclusions. Experiments must have been conducted rigorously, with appropriate controls, replication, and sample sizes. The conclusions must be drawn appropriately based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: N/A

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception (please refer to the Data Availability Statement in the manuscript PDF file). The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS ONE does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

Reviewer #2: Yes

**********

6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Authors have addressed all the points raised in my first round of revision and I believe the article is now ready for publication.

Reviewer #2: (No Response)

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Martina Valente

Reviewer #2: No

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