Enhancing infectious disease mapping with open access resources

Gene Drive for Mosquito Control: Where Did It Come from and Where Are We Headed?

Mosquito-borne pathogens place an enormous burden on human health. The existing toolkit is insufficient to support ongoing vector-control efforts towards meeting disease elimination and eradication goals. The perspective that genetic approaches can potentially add a significant set of tools toward mosquito control is not new, but the recent improvements in site-specific gene editing with CRISPR/Cas9 systems have enhanced our ability to both study mosquito biology using reverse genetics and produce genetics-based tools. Cas9-mediated gene-editing is an efficient and adaptable platform for gene drive strategies, which have advantages over innundative release strategies for introgressing desirable suppression and pathogen-blocking genotypes into wild mosquito populations; until recently, an effective gene drive has been largely out of reach. Many considerations will inform the effective use of new genetic tools, including gene drives. Here we review the lengthy history of genetic advances in mosquito biology and discuss both the impact of efficient site-specific gene editing on vector biology and the resulting potential to deploy new genetic tools for the abatement of mosquito-borne disease.

Big city, small world: density, contact rates, and transmission of dengue across Pakistan

Macroscopic descriptions of populations commonly assume that encounters between individuals are well mixed; i.e. each individual has an equal chance of coming into contact with any other individual. Relaxing this assumption can be challenging though, due to the difficulty of acquiring detailed knowledge about the non-random nature of encounters. Here, we fitted a mathematical model of dengue virus transmission to spatial time-series data from Pakistan and compared maximum-likelihood estimates of 'mixing parameters' when disaggregating data across an urban-rural gradient. We show that dynamics across this gradient are subject not only to differing transmission intensities but also to differing strengths of nonlinearity due to differences in mixing. Accounting for differences in mobility by incorporating two fine-scale, density-dependent covariate layers eliminates differences in mixing but results in a doubling of the estimated transmission potential of the large urban district of Lahore. We furthermore show that neglecting spatial variation in mixing can lead to substantial underestimates of the level of effort needed to control a pathogen with vaccines or other interventions. We complement this analysis with estimates of the relationships between dengue transmission intensity and other putative environmental drivers thereof.

Progress and Challenges in Infectious Disease Cartography

Quantitatively mapping the spatial distributions of infectious diseases is key to both investigating their epidemiology and identifying populations at risk of infection. Important advances in data quality and methodologies have allowed for better investigation of disease risk and its association with environmental factors. However, incorporating dynamic human behavioural processes in disease mapping remains challenging. For example, connectivity among human populations, a key driver of pathogen dispersal, has increased sharply over the past century, along with the availability of data derived from mobile phones and other dynamic data sources. Future work must be targeted towards the rapid updating and dissemination of appropriately designed disease maps to guide the public health community in reducing the global burden of infectious disease.

The global distribution of the arbovirus vectors Aedes aegypti and Ae. albopictus

Dengue and chikungunya are increasing global public health concerns due to their rapid geographical spread and increasing disease burden. Knowledge of the contemporary distribution of their shared vectors, Aedes aegypti and Aedes albopictus remains incomplete and is complicated by an ongoing range expansion fuelled by increased global trade and travel. Mapping the global distribution of these vectors and the geographical determinants of their ranges is essential for public health planning. Here we compile the largest contemporary database for both species and pair it with relevant environmental variables predicting their global distribution. We show Aedes distributions to be the widest ever recorded; now extensive in all continents, including North America and Europe. These maps will help define the spatial limits of current autochthonous transmission of dengue and chikungunya viruses. It is only with this kind of rigorous entomological baseline that we can hope to project future health impacts of these viruses.