Waterborne disease outbreak detection: an integrated approach using health administrative databases.

Hundreds of waterborne disease outbreaks (WBDO) of acute gastroenteritis (AGI) due to contaminated tap water are reported in developed countries each year. Such outbreaks are probably under-detected. The aim of our study was to develop an integrated approach to detect and study clusters of AGI in geographical areas with homogeneous exposure to drinking water.

Classification method for disease risk mapping based on discrete hidden Markov random fields.

Risk mapping in epidemiology enables areas with a low or high risk of disease contamination to be localized and provides a measure of risk differences between these regions. Risk mapping models for pooled data currently used by epidemiologists focus on the estimated risk for each geographical unit. They are based on a Poisson log-linear mixed model with a latent intrinsic continuous hidden Markov random field (HMRF) generally corresponding to a Gaussian autoregressive spatial smoothing.

Anthropogenic factors and the risk of highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1: prospects from a spatial-based model.

Beginning in 2003, highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) H5N1 virus spread across Southeast Asia, causing unprecedented epidemics. Thailand was massively infected in 2004 and 2005 and continues today to experience sporadic outbreaks. While research findings suggest that the spread of HPAI H5N1 is influenced primarily by trade patterns, identifying the anthropogenic risk factors involved remains a challenge.