Linking wildlife and disease prevalence
There has been much debate in disease ecology regarding the effects of biodiversity on human disease prevalence. The diversity-disease relationship often entails several causal links, including links between hosts and parasites, parasites and disease risk, and disease risk and disease prevalence and much of the diversity-disease debate has been due to the lack of evidence for theses linkages. There is support connecting host diversity and pathogen diversity, but little support for the connection between human disease risk and human disease prevalence. Much work relating host communities and human disease risk has been done in the Lyme disease system. The link between human disease risk and human disease prevalence has been difficult to establish, as human behavior, such as avoidance and insecticides, can disrupt this link. Establishing these pathways is imperative to developing effective public health plans, as tick-borne diseases are becoming more common throughout the United States and cost an estimated >$1 billion in annual healthcare costs in the United States alone.
Using publically funded datasets from the U.S. National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC), I am establishing links between wildlife (hosts, vectors, and pathogens) and human prevalence of several tick-borne diseases. Preliminary findings indicate correlations between mammal diversity and disease prevalence in humans, suggesting that public health management plans focusing on specific host species (white-footed mice) and vectors alone may not be enough to curb the growing issue of tick-borne diseases.
Using publically funded datasets from the U.S. National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC), I am establishing links between wildlife (hosts, vectors, and pathogens) and human prevalence of several tick-borne diseases. Preliminary findings indicate correlations between mammal diversity and disease prevalence in humans, suggesting that public health management plans focusing on specific host species (white-footed mice) and vectors alone may not be enough to curb the growing issue of tick-borne diseases.