Introduction Chikungunya is an emerging arbovirus that reached the Western Hemisphere at the end of 2013. Studies in the Indian Ocean and India suggest that passive surveillance systems cannot recognize many of deaths associated with chikungunya, which can be inferred by an increase in the overall mortality observed during chikungunya epidemics. Objective We assess the mortality associated wi...

To clarify the chronologic genetic diversity of coxsackievirus A16 (CV-A16) strains associated with hand, foot, and mouth disease (HFMD) epidemics in a restricted area and their genetic relation with those isolated in other areas, we investigated the genetic diversity of the 129 CV-A16 strains associated with HFMD epidemics in Fukushima, Japan, from 1983 to 2003, and compared their genetic rela...

For the past decade, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has been working toward eradicating rinderpest through vaccination and intense surveillance by 2012. Because of the potential severity of a rinderpest epidemic, it is prudent to prepare for an unexpected outbreak in animal populations. There is no immunity to the disease among the livestock or wildlife in the Unite...

Southern Africa continues to be the epicenter of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. This HIV-1 subtype C epidemic has a predominantly heterosexual mode of virus transmission and high (>15%) HIV prevalence among adults. The epidemiological dynamics of the HIV-1C epidemic in southern Africa are still poorly understood. Here, we aim at a better understanding of HIV transmission dynamics by analyzing HIV-1 sub...

Severe epidemics caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) and avian influenza viruses have recently killed hundreds of people while causing chaos and panic in many countries. These epidemics have distinct characteristics that make their politics significant and interesting, although both health policy analysts and political scientists have neglected the phenomenon. In this article, I ...

BACKGROUND In some Asian communities, HIV epidemics initially concentrated in high-risk groups develop into generalized epidemics, while in others HIV epidemics remain confined to high-risk groups. We examined whether blood exposures in a community, as indicated by hepatitis C virus (HCV) prevalence, can account for the variability in HIV prevalence in Asia. METHODOLOGY We searched the publis...

BACKGROUND Epidemics of infectious diseases usually start in small areas and subsequently become widespread widely. Although a method for detecting epidemics in public health center (PHC) areas has been proposed and used in the National Epidemiological Surveillance of Infectious Diseases in Japan, wide-area epidemics have not been fully investigated. METHODS Using the abovementioned method, w...

Optimal control of interdependent epidemics spreading over complex networks is a critical issue. We first establish a framework to capture the coupling between two epidemics, and then analyze the system’s equilibrium states by categorizing them into three classes, and deriving their stability conditions. The designed control strategy globally optimizes the trade-off between the control cost and...

The recent Ebola epidemic provides a dramatic example of the devastation and fear generated by epidemics, particularly those caused by new emerging or reemerging diseases. A focus on the control and prevention of diseases in living populations dominates most epidemic disease research. However, research on epidemics in the past provides a temporal depth to our understanding of the context and co...