| In contrast to expectations of the last century that infections could be brought under control, today we increasingly face threats from new emerging agents, transcending species boundaries, entering new geographic areas but also from well-known agents that turn out to be very persistent, escape immunity, that are difficult to control in outbreaks or that continuously evolve and thus, escape existing treatments. Avian influenza excellently exemplifies these issues: it has repeatedly crossed species-boundaries (e.g. from wild waterfowl to poultry species), continues to escape immunity by frequent mutations and is thus difficult to control in outbreaks. Although it will be impossible to prevent such outbreaks, a fundamental understanding of the origin and spread of influenza viruses (IV) through animal and human populations may play a key role in designing strategies to recognize the threats early and to minimize the risk of outbreaks. Therefore, we aim to combine epidemiological and behaviour-based models and in particular, to shed light on the role of migratory waterfowl in the spread of infectious diseases by successively testing the assumptions of 1) Within-individual processes: Testing consequences of IV infections on individuals, e.g. on reproductive success, mortality; 2) Between-individual processes: What are the population-level consequences and patterns given the assumptions under 1) and transmission rates/ modes (local and individual events)? For both, we will identify the conditions under which IV may persist in a host-population and determine characteristics of the spatio-temporal spread of IV among populations. Thus, combining epidemiology and bird migration in such model will identify key times and places for the spread of infectious diseases as well as sensitive parts in the dynamics of hosts and pathogens and thereby, provide a basis for potential management actions. |
