Host movement, transmission hot spots, and vector-borne disease dynamics on spatial networks

TL;DR

This paper analyzes how spatial heterogeneity and host mobility influence vector-borne disease spread on networks, providing a mathematical approximation of the reproduction number and applying it to malaria in Namibia.

Contribution

It introduces a closed-form approximation for the domain reproduction number in spatial disease models considering host movement and applies it to real-world malaria data.

Findings

Analytical approximation of the basic reproduction number.

Sensitivity analysis of model parameters.

Application to malaria transmission in Namibia.

Abstract

We examine how spatial heterogeneity combines with mobility network structure to influence vector-borne disease dynamics. Specifically, we consider a Ross-Macdonald-type disease model on $n$ spatial locations that are coupled by host movement on a strongly connected, weighted, directed graph. We derive a closed form approximation to the domain reproduction number using a Laurent series expansion, and use this approximation to compute sensitivities of the basic reproduction number to model parameters. To illustrate how these results can be used to help inform mitigation strategies, as a case study we apply these results to malaria dynamics in Namibia, using published cell phone data and estimates for local disease transmission. Our analytical results are particularly useful for understanding drivers of transmission when mobility sinks and transmission hot spots do not coincide.