Publications by authors named "Ferchito Avelino"

Article Synopsis
  • * A case-control study identified 29 cases of illness linked to symptoms like abdominal pain, fever, and diarrhoea, with a significant risk factor being the consumption of butchered meat from a dead carabao.
  • * The findings suggest that the outbreak was caused by eating the dead carabao, highlighting the need for better education on zoonotic disease prevention in farming communities.
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Background: Stratifying dengue risk within endemic countries is crucial for allocating limited control interventions. Current methods of monitoring dengue transmission intensity rely on potentially inaccurate incidence estimates. We investigated whether incidence or alternate metrics obtained from standard, or laboratory, surveillance operations represent accurate surrogate indicators of the burden of dengue and can be used to monitor the force of infection (FOI) across urban centres.

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Zika virus (ZIKV) exposure across flavivirus-endemic countries, including the Philippines, remains largely unknown despite sporadic case reporting and environmental suitability for transmission. Using laboratory surveillance data from 2016, 997 serum samples were randomly selected from suspected dengue (DENV) case reports across the Philippines and assayed for serological markers of short-term (IgM) and long-term (IgG) ZIKV exposure. Using mixture models, we re-evaluated ZIKV IgM/G seroprevalence thresholds and used catalytic models to quantify the force of infection (attack rate, AR) from age-accumulated ZIKV exposure.

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Background: In dengue-endemic countries, targeting limited control interventions to populations at risk of severe disease could enable increased efficiency. Individuals who have had their first (primary) dengue infection are at risk of developing more severe secondary disease, thus could be targeted for disease prevention. Currently, there is no reliable algorithm for determining primary and post-primary (infection with more than one flavivirus) status from a single serum sample.

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Background: Findings were published in 2015 that highlighted the endemicity of Japanese Encephalitis (JE) in the Philippines. The policymakers responded by conducting an immunization campaign and strengthening the surveillance system. Using data on the revitalized surveillance system, the epidemiology of JE in the country was updated.

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Background: The majority of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) do not have adequate civil registration and vital statistics (CRVS) systems to properly support health policy formulation. Verbal autopsy (VA), long used in research, can provide useful information on the cause of death (COD) in populations where physicians are not available to complete medical certificates of COD. Here, we report on the application of the SmartVA tool for the collection and analysis of data in several countries as part of routine CRVS activities.

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Introduction: The post-disaster management of the dead involves a series of steps including on-site identification, transfer, storage and examination of bodies and delivery to families for burial. Two weeks after Typhoon Haiyan, a team from the Department of Health (DOH) was tasked with identifying the dead in Tacloban City.

Methods: A suitable site for the collection of bodies was identified and an algorithm and standard data collection form developed.

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