Volume 13, Number 10—October 2007
THEME ISSUE
Global Poverty and Human Development
Dispatch
West Nile Virus Infection among the Homeless, Houston, Texas1
Tamra E. Meyer*, Lara M. Bull*, Kelly Cain Holmes*, Rhia F. Pascua*, Amelia Travassos da Rosa†, Christian R. Gutierrez*, Tracie Corbin*, Jennifer L. Woodward*, Jeffrey P. Taylor‡, Robert B. Tesh†, and Kristy O. Murray*
Table 1
Participant demographics and WNV prevalence from the 2004 Houston Homeless Seroprevalence Study*
| Demographic characteristics | All participants, n = 397 (%) | WNV prevalence |
Risk for WNV infection, OR (95% CI) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No. (%) | 95% CI | |||||
| Sex | ||||||
| Female | 110 (28) | 3 (2.7) | 0.6–7.8 | Reference | ||
| Male | 287 (72) | 24 (8.4) | 5.4–12.2 | 3.3 (0.96–11.0) | ||
| Age, y | ||||||
| 18–34 | 97 (24) | 2 (2.1) | 0.3–7.3 | Reference | ||
| 35–49 | 204 (51) | 17 (8.3) | 4.9–13.0 | 4.3 (0.98–19.1) | ||
| >50 | 95 (24) | 8 (8.4) | 3.7–15.9 | 4.4 (0.9–21.1) | ||
| Unknown |
1 (0.3) |
0 |
– |
– |
||
| Race | ||||||
| White | 120 (30) | 8 (6.7) | 2.9–12.7 | Reference | ||
| Black | 233 (59) | 18 (7.7) | 4.6–11.9 | 1.2 (0.5–2.8) | ||
| Other/unknown | 44 (11) | 1 (2.3) | 0.06–12.0 | 0.3 (0.04–2.7) | ||
| Ethnicity | ||||||
| Hispanic | 52 (13) | 2 (3.9) | 0.5–13.2 | Reference | ||
| Non-Hispanic | 343 (86) | 24 (7.0) | 4.5–10.2 | 1.9 (0.4–8.2) | ||
| No response | 2 (0.5) | 1 (50.0) | 1.3–98.7 | – | ||
*WNV, West Nile virus; OR, odds ratio; CI, confidence interval.
