Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses

A special issue of Viruses (ISSN 1999-4915). This special issue belongs to the section "Human Virology and Viral Diseases".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 June 2023) | Viewed by 11675

Special Issue Editors

Department of Preventive Medicine, Konyang University College of Medicine, Daejeon 35365, Korea
Interests: influenza; SARS-CoV-2; public health measure; transmission; epidemiology; community
School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China
Interests: influenza; SARS-CoV-2; other respiratory viruses; epidemiology; computational epidemiology; vaccine; control policies
Department of Preventive Medicine, Korea University College of Medicine, Seoul 02841, Korea
Interests: influenza; SARS-CoV-2; epidemiology; computational epidemiology; respiratory viruses; vaccine; spatial epidemiology

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The respiratory viruses circulating in the community, including influenza and emerging respiratory viruses such as SARS-CoV-2, have caused epidemics and pandemics, and have a significant impact on human life.

To improve public health decision-making policies for real-time community-based mitigation and intervention strategies, it is key to understand the epidemiology and transmission dynamics of the viruses at different levels, from individuals to the community.

In this Special Issue, we welcome the submission of research articles detailing (1) the most current findings on the individual and community-based epidemiology and transmission dynamics of human respiratory viruses; (2) the impact assessment of different interventions including vaccinations via applying quantitative computational epidemiology analysis; (3) the inference and pattern identification of the disease dynamics of virus infections in the community; and (4) the prediction of the future burden of infections using syndromic and viral data.

For this Special Issue, our prime objectives are to explore and make a step forward in the research on infectious disease epidemiology, and to accumulate the scientific evidence for the impact of pharmaceutical/non-pharmaceutical measures to mitigate or control infectious diseases in the community.

Dr. Sukhyun Ryu
Dr. Sheikh Taslim Ali
Dr. Byung Chul Chun
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

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Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Viruses is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • respiratory virus
  • computational epidemiology
  • transmission
  • modeling
  • community

Published Papers (5 papers)

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Research

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16 pages, 7005 KiB  
Article
SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Cities from the Southern Region of Bahia State, Brazil: Analysis of Variables Associated in Both Individual and Community Level
by Murillo Ferreira da Silva, Uener Ribeiro dos Santos, Fabrício Barbosa Ferreira, George Rego Albuquerque, Ana Paula Melo Mariano, Hllytchaikra Ferraz Fehlberg, Íris Terezinha Santos de Santana, Pérola Rodrigues dos Santos, Luciano Cardoso Santos, Laine Lopes Silva de Jesus, Karoline Almeida Piton, Beatriz Santos Costa, Beatriz Sena Moreira Gomes, Vinicius Moreira Porto, Emanuelly da Silva Oliveira, Cibele Luz Oliveira, Renato Fontana, Bianca Mendes Maciel, Mylene de Melo Silva, Lauro Juliano Marin and Sandra Rocha Gadelhaadd Show full author list remove Hide full author list
Viruses 2023, 15(7), 1583; https://doi.org/10.3390/v15071583 - 20 Jul 2023
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1055
Abstract
The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), challenged public health systems worldwide. Individuals in low-income countries/regions are still at individual and community risk concerning inequality, sanitation, and economic conditions. Besides, during the pandemic, the transmission in municipalities [...] Read more.
The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), challenged public health systems worldwide. Individuals in low-income countries/regions are still at individual and community risk concerning inequality, sanitation, and economic conditions. Besides, during the pandemic, the transmission in municipalities and communities in the countryside and less developed regions kept viral spread and required structured and strengthened clinical and laboratory surveillance. Here, we present an observational, analytic, cross-sectional study conducted using secondary data from the Laboratório de Farmacogenômica e Epidemiologia Molecular (LAFEM)-Universidade Estadual de Santa Cruz (UESC), to evaluate individual and community factors associated to SARS-CoV-2 infection in outpatients from different cities from Southern Region of Bahia State, in Brazil. The data were collected between June 2021 and May 2022. The SARS-CoV-2 positivity by RT-qPCR was correlated with low socio-economic indicators, including the Human development index (HDIc) and Average worker salary (AWSc). Besides, in general, females were less likely to test positive for SARS-CoV-2 (OR = 0.752; CI 95% 0.663–0.853; p < 0.0001), while brown individuals had more positivity for infection (p < 0.0001). In addition, those who had clinical symptoms were more likely to test positive for SARS-CoV-2 (OR = 6.000; CI 95% 4.932–7.299; p < 0.0001). Although dry cough, headache, and fever were the most frequent, loss of taste (OR = 5.574; CI 95% 4.334–7.186) and loss of smell (OR = 6.327; CI 95% 4.899–8.144) presented higher odds ratio to be positive to SARS-CoV-2 by RT-qPCR. Nonetheless, the distribution of these characteristics was not homogenous among the different cities, especially for age and gender. The dynamic of SARS-CoV-2 positivity differed between cities and the total population and reinforces the hypothesis that control strategies for prevention needed to be developed based on both individual and community risk levels to mitigate harm to individuals and the health system. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses)
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12 pages, 1658 KiB  
Article
Indirect Protection from Vaccinating Children against Influenza A Virus Infection in Households
by Tim K. Tsang, Can Wang, Vicky J. Fang, Ranawaka A. P. M. Perera, Hau Chi So, Dennis K. M. Ip, J. S. Malik Peiris, Gabriel M. Leung, Simon Cauchemez and Benjamin J. Cowling
Viruses 2022, 14(10), 2097; https://doi.org/10.3390/v14102097 - 21 Sep 2022
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1641
Abstract
Influenza vaccination is an important intervention to prevent influenza virus infection. Our previous analysis suggested that indirect protection is limited in an influenza B epidemic in Hong Kong. We further analyzed six influenza A epidemics to determine such potential. We applied a statistical [...] Read more.
Influenza vaccination is an important intervention to prevent influenza virus infection. Our previous analysis suggested that indirect protection is limited in an influenza B epidemic in Hong Kong. We further analyzed six influenza A epidemics to determine such potential. We applied a statistical model to estimate household transmission dynamics in the 3 influenza A(H3N2) and 3 pandemic influenza A(H1N1) epidemics. Then, we estimated the reduction in infection risk among unvaccinated household members when all children in households are vaccinated, with different assumptions on vaccine efficacy (VE). In the optimal scenario that VE was 70%, the reduction to the total probability of infection was only marginal, with relative probabilities ranged from 0.91–0.94 when all children in households were vaccinated because community was by far the main source of infection during the six epidemics in our study. The proportion of cases attributed to household transmission was 10% (95% CrI: 7%, 13%). Individual influenza vaccination is important even when other household members are vaccinated, given the degree of indirect protection is small. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses)
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Review

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10 pages, 314 KiB  
Review
Collateral Impact of Public Health and Social Measures on Respiratory Virus Activity during the COVID-19 Pandemic 2020–2021
by Chiara Achangwa, Huikyung Park, Sukhyun Ryu and Moo-Sik Lee
Viruses 2022, 14(5), 1071; https://doi.org/10.3390/v14051071 - 17 May 2022
Cited by 24 | Viewed by 2818
Abstract
Many countries have implemented public health and social measures (PHSMs) to control the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Although the PHSMs are targeted at SARS-CoV-2 transmission control, they directly or indirectly impact the epidemiology of different respiratory viral diseases. The [...] Read more.
Many countries have implemented public health and social measures (PHSMs) to control the spread of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2). Although the PHSMs are targeted at SARS-CoV-2 transmission control, they directly or indirectly impact the epidemiology of different respiratory viral diseases. The purpose of this study was to investigate the collateral impact of PHSMs used during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic on the epidemiology of other respiratory viruses, including influenza, parainfluenza, respiratory syncytial virus, rhinovirus, and adenovirus infections. We conducted a systematic review of the published literature on changes in the incidence of respiratory viral diseases and detection rates of the respiratory viruses during COVID-19 pandemic, lasting from 2020–2021, published between December 2019 and March 2022 in PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane Library databases. We identified an overall decrease of 23–94% in the incidence of respiratory viral diseases and a decrease of 0–98% in the detection of the viruses. Our study suggests that the PHSMs implemented during COVID-19 pandemic reduced the incidence of respiratory viral diseases and transmission of respiratory viruses. At the time of this study, and as governments relax PHSMs, public health authorities should prepare for a probable increase in the burden of respiratory viral diseases. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses)
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Other

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11 pages, 1299 KiB  
Opinion
Measles Outbreak Response Activity in Japan, and a Discussion for a Possible Strategy of Outbreak Response Using Cycle Threshold Values of Real-Time Reverse Transcription PCR for Measles Virus in Measles Elimination Settings
by Junji Seto, Yoko Aoki, Kenichi Komabayashi, Keiko Yamada, Hitoshi Ishikawa, Tomoo Ichikawa, Tadayuki Ahiko and Katsumi Mizuta
Viruses 2023, 15(1), 171; https://doi.org/10.3390/v15010171 - 06 Jan 2023
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Abstract
Measles is a highly contagious, but vaccine-preventable disease caused by the measles virus (MeV). Although the administration of two doses of measles vaccines is the most effective strategy to prevent and eliminate measles, MeV continues to spread worldwide, even in 2022. In measles-eliminated [...] Read more.
Measles is a highly contagious, but vaccine-preventable disease caused by the measles virus (MeV). Although the administration of two doses of measles vaccines is the most effective strategy to prevent and eliminate measles, MeV continues to spread worldwide, even in 2022. In measles-eliminated countries, preparedness and response to measles outbreaks originating from imported cases are required to maintain elimination status. Under these circumstances, real-time reverse transcription (RT) PCR for MeV could provide a diagnostic method capable of strengthening the subnational capacity for outbreak responses. Real-time RT-PCR can detect MeV RNA from patients with measles at the initial symptomatic stage, which can enable rapid public health responses aimed at detecting their contacts and common sources of infection. Furthermore, low cycle threshold (Ct) values (i.e., high viral load) of throat swabs indicate high infectiousness in patients with measles. The high basic reproduction number of measles suggests that patients with high infectiousness can easily become super-spreaders. This opinion proposes a possible strategy of rapid and intensive responses to counter measles outbreaks caused by super-spreader candidates showing low Ct values in throat swabs. Our strategy would make it possible to effectively prevent further measles transmission, thereby leading to the early termination of measles outbreaks. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses)
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8 pages, 1048 KiB  
Commentary
Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Infectious Diseases and Control Measures
by Sukhyun Ryu, June Young Chun, Sunmi Lee, Daesung Yoo, Yongdai Kim, Sheikh Taslim Ali and Byung Chul Chun
Viruses 2022, 14(11), 2510; https://doi.org/10.3390/v14112510 - 12 Nov 2022
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 2660
Abstract
The epidemiology and transmission dynamics of infectious diseases must be understood at the individual and community levels to improve public health decision-making for real-time and integrated community-based control strategies. Herein, we explore the epidemiological characteristics for assessing the impact of public health interventions [...] Read more.
The epidemiology and transmission dynamics of infectious diseases must be understood at the individual and community levels to improve public health decision-making for real-time and integrated community-based control strategies. Herein, we explore the epidemiological characteristics for assessing the impact of public health interventions in the community setting and their applications. Computational statistical methods could advance research on infectious disease epidemiology and accumulate scientific evidence of the potential impacts of pharmaceutical/nonpharmaceutical measures to mitigate or control infectious diseases in the community. Novel public health threats from emerging zoonotic infectious diseases are urgent issues. Given these direct and indirect mitigating impacts at various levels to different infectious diseases and their burdens, we must consider an integrated assessment approach, ‘One Health’, to understand the dynamics and control of infectious diseases. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Epidemiology and Transmission Dynamics of Respiratory Viruses)
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