Development of a transboundary model of livestock disease in Europe

Abstract

Epidemiological models of notifiable livestock disease are typically framed at a national level and targeted for specific diseases. There are inherent difficulties in extending models beyond national borders as details of the livestock population, production systems and marketing systems of neighbouring countries are not always readily available. It can also be a challenge to capture heterogeneities in production systems, control policies, and response resourcing across multiple countries, in a single transboundary model. In this paper we describe EuFMDiS, a continental-scale modelling framework for transboundary animal disease, specifically designed to support emergency animal disease planning in Europe. EuFMDiS simulates the spread of livestock disease within and between countries and allows control policies to be enacted and resourced on per-country basis. It provides a sophisticated decision support tool that can be used to look at the risk of disease introduction, establishment and spread; control approaches in terms of effectiveness and costs; resource management; and post-outbreak management issues.

Assessment of the interactions between the European Foot‐and‐Mouth Disease Spread model (EuFMDiS) and the SIGMA project

“…One important benefit of EuFMDiS is the possibility of simulating spread between various countries, as there are high levels of trade, travels, and risks of disease spread via movement of livestock between European countries. The model software can be used non-commercially under a licensing agreement with EuFMD (Bradhurst, et al, 2021).…”

“…The model simulates FMD spread within and between herds, as well as within and between countries, through different transmission mechanisms. Different control measures are then eligible to simulate control of the disease spread (Bradhurst, et al, 2021). All control measures stated in the EU directives on FMD disease control are included in EuFMDiS (de Vos, Gonzales, Hagenaars, & Dekker).…”

“…EuFMDiS is designed to support planning and decision making for emergency outbreaks in Europe (Bradhurst, et al, 2021). EFSA is an agency funded by the EU with the purpose of providing a source of scientific advice and communicating risks associated with the food chain (European Food Safety Authority, 2021).…”

“…If a country wants to use EuFMDiS with data from other countries, agreements between countries will be needed concerning data in SIGMA and in EuFMDiS, regardless of if it is run locally or in the cloud, and passwordprotected accounts could be a solution to access the data. Some variables or datasets may also need to be anonymized or obfuscated, if possible, in order to share data between countries, which is made possible both in SIGMA (EFSA, et al, 2019) and in the pilot project of EuFMDiS (Bradhurst, et al, 2021) According to one of the consulted experts, collaboration and agreements between certain countries that use EuFMDiS for a common model could be relatively easy, and a pilot study between various countries has already been conducted. If EFSA were to use EuFMDiS, the legal aspects would be more complicated and require the involvement the European Commission.…”