Houriiyah Tegally (South Africa), Jenicca Poongavanan (South Africa), Monika Moir (South Africa), Moritz U.G. Kraemer (Oxford), Tulio de Oliveira (South Africa)
Summary: This project will contribute to risk assessment for Dengue circulation and outbreaks in Africa by developing a conceptual and methodological framework to integrate climatic, mobility and population covariates within genomic epidemiology with the following goals: 1) Research towards arboviruses (e.g. Dengue) in Africa are limited and when they exist, are restricted to small local outbreak investigations. This project aims to take a continental approach to investigate risks of importations of Dengue from Asia and Latin-America, cross-border transmission in Africa and uncover patterns linked to climate events and human mobility; 2) Rather than analyzing genomic, epidemiological or climatic data in silos, like is often the case in infectious disease research, this proposal aims to employ integrative data analysis approaches with genomic epidemiology, phylodynamics and climatic modeling approaches; 3) Assess the likelihood of endemic circulation vs re-introductions of Dengue in Africa and consequently pinpoint the current and future gaps in genomic surveillance to guide upcoming efforts to scale up sequencing.
Activity Type: Research Project
CLIMADE Africa