Dynamics of a Tularemia Outbreak in a Closely Monitored Free-Roaming Population of Wild House Mice.

Dobay, Akos; Pilo, Paola; Lindholm, Anna K; Origgi, Francesco; Bagheri, Homayoun C; König, Barbara (2015). Dynamics of a Tularemia Outbreak in a Closely Monitored Free-Roaming Population of Wild House Mice. PLoS ONE, 10(11), e0141103. Public Library of Science 10.1371/journal.pone.0141103

Preview

Text http___www.plosone.org_article_fetchObject.action_uri=info_doi_10.1371_journal.pone.pdf - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons: Attribution (CC-BY). Download (617kB) | Preview

Infectious disease outbreaks can be devastating because of their sudden occurrence, as well as the complexity of monitoring and controlling them. Outbreaks in wildlife are even more challenging to observe and describe, especially when small animals or secretive species are involved. Modeling such infectious disease events is relevant to investigating their dynamics and is critical for decision makers to accomplish outbreak management. Tularemia, caused by the bacterium Francisella tularensis, is a potentially lethal zoonosis. Of the few animal outbreaks that have been reported in the literature, only those affecting zoo animals have been closely monitored. Here, we report the first estimation of the basic reproduction number R0 of an outbreak in wildlife caused by F. tularensis using quantitative modeling based on a susceptible-infected-recovered framework. We applied that model to data collected during an extensive investigation of an outbreak of tularemia caused by F. tularensis subsp. holarctica (also designated as type B) in a closely monitored, free-roaming house mouse (Mus musculus domesticus) population in Switzerland. Based on our model and assumptions, the best estimated basic reproduction number R0 of the current outbreak is 1.33. Our results suggest that tularemia can cause severe outbreaks in small rodents. We also concluded that the outbreak self-exhausted in approximately three months without administrating antibiotics.

Interest & Impact

Downloads

178 since deposited on 18 Feb 2016
16 in the past 12 months

Citations

5 Citations in Web of Science ®
6 Citations in Scopus

Search

in Google Scholar™

Services

Actions (login required)

Edit item

Actions (login required)

Edit item