Characterizing risk factors for infection of Mycobacterium bovis between wild pigs and domestic cattle from an outbreak response - California, 1961-1967.

In the United States (US), a national control program from bovine tuberculosis (bTB) has been successful at greatly reducing the incidence of Mycobacterium bovis infection in domestic cattle and mitigating exposure to humans. However, experience in many countries, including the US, has demonstrated that eradication of animal tuberculosis (TB) from wildlife can complicate disease control programs. Wild pigs may serve as an important maintenance species for TB, contributing to outbreaks in cattle and hampering disease control programs.

Forecasting Hepatitis C Virus Status for Children in the United States: A Modeling Study.

Background: Virtually all cases of hepatitis C virus (HCV) infection in children in the United States occur through vertical transmission, but it is unknown how many children are infected. Cases of maternal HCV infection have increased in the United States, which may increase the number of children vertically infected with HCV. Infection has long-term consequences for a child's health, but treatment options are now available for children ≥3 years old.

Characterizing the seasonal abundance and reproductive activity of overwintering Anopheles (Diptera: Culicidae) mosquitoes.

In temperate regions of the United States, female Anopheles mosquitoes respond to low temperatures and short photoperiods by entering an overwintering dormancy or diapause. Diapause in Anopheles results in reduced frequency of blood-feeding and reproductive arrest, indicating a period when pathogen transmission by these mosquitoes is unlikely. However, it is unclear precisely how late into the fall and how early in the spring these mosquitoes are biting, reproducing, and potentially transmitting pathogens.

Mumps epidemic dynamics in the United States before vaccination (1923-1932).

Mumps is a vaccine-preventable, reemerging, and highly transmissible infectious disease. Widespread vaccination dramatically reduced cases; however, case counts have been increasing over the past 20 years. To provide a quantitative overview of historical mumps dynamics that can act as baseline information to help identify causes of mumps reemergence, we analyzed timeseries of cases reported from 1923 to 1932 in the United States.

Characterizing seasonal changes in the reproductive activity of Culex mosquitoes throughout the fall, winter, and spring in Ohio.

Background: Culex mosquitoes are the primary vectors of West Nile virus (WNV) across the USA. Understanding when these vectors are active indicates times when WNV transmission can occur. This study determined the proportion of female Culex mosquitoes that were in diapause during the fall and winter and when they terminated diapause and began blood feeding in the spring.

Quantifying intra- and inter-species contact rates at supplemental feeding sites in Ethiopia to inform rabies maintenance potential of multiple host species.

Rabies, a multi-host pathogen responsible for the loss of roughly 59,000 human lives each year worldwide, continues to impose a significant burden of disease despite control efforts, especially in Ethiopia. However, how species other than dogs contribute to rabies transmission throughout Ethiopia remains largely unknown. In this study, we quantified interactions among wildlife species in Ethiopia with the greatest potential for contributing to rabies maintenance.

Confirmed circulation of SARS-CoV-2 in Irish blood donors prior to first national notification of infection.

Introduction: Blood donor studies offer a unique opportunity to screen healthy populations for the presence of antibodies to emerging infections. We describe the use of blood donor specimens to track the 'first-wave' of the COVID-19 pandemic in Ireland.

Methodology: A random selection of donor samples received by the Irish Blood Transfusion Service (IBTS) between February and September 2020 (n = 8,509) were screened by multiple commercial SARs-CoV-2 antibody assays.

Lessons learnt from syphilis-infected blood donors: a timely reminder of missed opportunities.

Objective: Due to the increased number of syphilis infections diagnosed in the UK and beyond, we reviewed our data on blood donors infected with syphilis in the UK and Ireland between 2016 and 2019.

Methods: Data were extracted from the surveillance database for all blood donors confirmed positive for syphilis in the UK and Ireland between 2016 and 2019, together with the total number of donations tested during that period. Data on positive cases included gender, age group, reported treatment, symptoms and confirmatory results.

Critical Photoperiod and Its Potential to Predict Mosquito Distributions and Control Medically Important Pests.

Diapause, a period of arrested development that allows mosquitoes to survive inhospitable conditions, is triggered by short daylengths in temperate mosquitoes. Different populations of mosquitoes initiate diapause in response to a specific photoperiod, or daylength, resulting in population-specific differences in annual cycles of abundance. The photoperiod that causes approximately 50% of a population to initiate diapause is known as the critical photoperiod (CPP).

Screening Awareness of HPV-Related Oropharyngeal Cancers and Attitudes and Concerns towards HPV Vaccination Among Parents : HPV and Oropharyngeal Cancer.

Baseline population opinions on human papillomavirus (HPV) and HPV vaccination must be understood before physicians can address knowledge gaps in that population and encourage timely vaccination. To determine the opinions of parents of children age 9 to 18 on HPV-related oropharyngeal cancers (OPC); the associations with education level, socioeconomic status, and having a family member/friend with OPC; and the main concerns against having a vaccination., An anonymous survey was created and administered.

Multiple urban stressors drive fish-based ecological networks in streams of Columbus, Ohio, USA.

Integrating a network perspective into multiple-stressor research can reveal indirect stressor effects and simultaneously estimate both taxonomic and functional community characteristics, thus representing a novel approach to stressor paradigms in rivers. Using six years of data from twelve streams of Columbus, Ohio, USA, the effects of nutrients (N:P), impervious surface (%IS), and sedimentation on network properties were quantified. Variability in the strength and distribution of trophic interactions was assessed by incorporating biomass into networks.

A Board Level Intervention to Develop Organisation-Wide Quality Improvement Strategies: Cost-Consequences Analysis in 15 Healthcare Organisations.

Background: Hospital boards have statutory responsibility for upholding the quality of care in their organisations. International research on quality in hospitals resulted in a research-based guide to help senior hospital leaders develop and implement quality improvement (QI) strategies, the QUASER Guide. Previous research has established a link between board practices and quality of care; however, to our knowledge, no board-level intervention has been evaluated in relation to its costs and consequences.

New approaches to controlling an outbreak of chickenpox in a large immigration detention setting in England: the role of serological testing and mathematical modelling.

Chickenpox is caused by varicella-zoster-virus (VZV) and is highly contagious. Immigration detention settings are a high-risk environment for primary VZV transmission, with large, rapidly-changing populations in close quarters, and higher susceptibility among non-UK-born individuals. During outbreaks, operational challenges occur in detention settings because of high-turnover and the potential need to implement population movement restriction for prolonged periods.

The acceptability of using a lottery to allocate research funding: a survey of applicants.

Background: The Health Research Council of New Zealand is the first major government funding agency to use a lottery to allocate research funding for their Explorer Grant scheme. This is a somewhat controversial approach because, despite the documented problems of peer review, many researchers believe that funding should be allocated solely using peer review, and peer review is used almost ubiquitously by funding agencies around the world. Given the rarity of alternative funding schemes, there is interest in hearing from the first cohort of researchers to ever experience a lottery.

Forecasting Prevalence of HIV-1 Integrase Strand Transfer Inhibitor (INSTI) Drug Resistance: A Modeling Study.

Background: Antiretroviral therapy (ART) is a cornerstone of HIV-1 treatment and provides significant health benefits for patients with responsive HIV-1 strains. Integrase strand transfer inhibitors (INSTIs) are the newest class of ART. Although most HIV-1 cases are responsive, a small number are already resistant.

Network analyses to quantify effects of host movement in multilevel disease transmission models using foot and mouth disease in Cameroon as a case study.

The dynamics of infectious diseases are greatly influenced by the movement of both susceptible and infected hosts. To accurately represent disease dynamics among a mobile host population, detailed movement models have been coupled with disease transmission models. However, a number of different host movement models have been proposed, each with their own set of assumptions and results that differ from the other models.

Network analyses of transhumance movements and simulations of foot-and-mouth disease virus transmission among mobile livestock in Cameroon.

Foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) affects cloven-hoofed livestock and agricultural economies worldwide. Analyses of the 2001 FMD outbreak in the United Kingdom informed how livestock movement contributed to disease spread. However, livestock reared in other locations use different production systems that might also influence disease dynamics.

Modeling the role of carrier and mobile herds on foot-and-mouth disease virus endemicity in the Far North Region of Cameroon.

Foot and mouth disease virus (FMDV) is an RNA virus that infects cloven-hoofed animals, often produces either epidemic or endemic conditions, and negatively affects agricultural economies worldwide. FMDV epidemic dynamics have been extensively studied, but understanding of drivers of disease persistence in areas in which FMDV is endemic, such as most of sub-Saharan Africa, is lacking. We present a spatial stochastic model of disease dynamics that incorporates a spatial transmission kernel in a modified Gillespie algorithm, and use it to evaluate two hypothesized drivers of endemicity: asymptomatic carriers and the movement of mobile herds.

Blood Donor Screening for Hepatitis E Virus in the European Union.

This review article summarises hepatitis E virus (HEV) blood donation screening strategies in effect in the European Union (EU). Since 2012, eight EU countries have implemented HEV screening. Local rates of seroprevalence, RNA incidence, and molecular epidemiology are variable and not usually directly comparable.

Explaining organisational responses to a board-level quality improvement intervention: findings from an evaluation in six providers in the English National Health Service.

Background: Healthcare systems worldwide are concerned with strengthening board-level governance of quality. We applied Lozeau, Langley and Denis' typology (transformation, customisation, loose coupling and corruption) to describe and explain the organisational response to an improvement intervention in six hospital boards in England.

Methods: We conducted fieldwork over a 30-month period as part of an evaluation in six healthcare provider organisations in England.

Transfusion-transmitted hepatitis B virus (HBV) infection from an individual-donation nucleic acid (ID-NAT) non-reactive donor.

Lookback was initiated upon notification of an acute HBV infection in a repeat Irish donor, 108 days post-donation. The donation screened non-reactive by individual-donation nucleic acid testing (ID-NAT) using the Procleix Ultrio Elite multiplex assay and again when the archived sample was retested, but the discriminatory assay for HBV was reactive. The immunocompromised recipient of the implicated red cell component was tested 110 days post-transfusion, revealing a HBV DNA viral load of 470 IU/ml.

Professionals learning together with patients: An exploratory study of a collaborative learning Fellowship programme for healthcare improvement.

Improving the quality of healthcare involves collaboration between many different stakeholders. Collaborative learning theory suggests that teaching different professional groups alongside each other may enable them to develop skills in how to collaborate effectively, but there is little literature on how this works in practice. Further, though it is recognised that patients play a fundamental role in quality improvement, there are few examples of where they learn together with professionals.

Host species heterogeneity in the epidemiology of Nesopora caninum.

Pathogen transmission across species drives disease emergence; however, mechanisms by which multi-host pathogens cross species boundaries are not well identified. This knowledge gap prevents integrated and targeted control in an epidemiologically continuous ecosystem. Our goal is to describe the impact of host species heterogeneity on the epidemiology of Neospora caninum circulating between livestock and wildlife in southeastern Ohio.