'Modelling the epidemiological implications for SARS-CoV-2 of Christmas household bubbles in England'

Presented recently at #BAMC2024 in a modelling applications in public health mini-symposia

📽️ Talk slides: edmhill.github.io/talks/BAMC2024

📄 Associated paper: doi.org/10.1016/j.jtbi…

As of 4 April 2024, highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 confirmed by USDA APHIS in dairy cows on 16 farms in the USA: Texas (8 farms), Kansas (3), New Mexico (2), Michigan (1), Idaho (1), and Ohio (1). #vogelgriep

aphis.usda.gov/livestock-poul…

CLOSING !!!SUNDAY!!! 7th APRIL⭐️

Modelling and inference for pandemic preparedness - a focussed workshop,

📅5-9 August 2024
📍Isaac Newton Institute of Mathematical Sciences, Cambridge, UK
📈Statistical inference
⚖️modelling to inform policy making.
newton.ac.uk/event/mipw01/

New preprint: Reconstructed influenza A/H3N2 infection histories reveal variation in incidence and antibody dynamics over the life course

medrxiv.org/content/10.110…

1/12

Epidemiological situation of #HPAI in Europe (Dec 2023-March 2024)

⏩ First detection of the A(H5N5) subtype in red foxes
⏩ Still no key mutations from avian to human-type receptors identified in A(H5) viruses isolated from mammals
Read the new report👉europa.eu/!X3pBTG

📃 UK Health Security Agency #Influenza surveillance update

🗓️ Wk 13 2024 data (25-31 Mar 2024)

📊 Respiratory DataMart: ⬇️ influenza positivity (4.5% to 3.6%)

🏥 Influenza hospitalisation rate: ⬇️ into baseline range

🚑 ICU admission rate: ↔️ & in baseline range

🔗: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/660e7143…

1/ As the number of #H5N1 infected farms climbs, the likelihood that we're seeing cow-to-cow transmission also climbs.

What's concerning me most may seem a bit counter-intuitive.

The publicly available genomes *don't* show many mutational changes.

Why does that worry me? 🧵

In response to the H5N1 infections in cows and now a human in Texas, we've just updated our North America specific H5Nx Nextstrain build with the cow and goat sequences, which are viewable under 'Species-grouped: Ruminant': nextstrain.org/groups/moncla-…. A few notes.

🦆 Latest World Organisation for Animal Health #HPAI Situation Report. #Influenza

🗓️ Covers 17 Feb-15 Mar 2024

📊 21 outbreaks reported in poultry & 62 in non-poultry birds + mammals over the 4 weeks

▶️ About 405,000 poultry birds died/culled in 4 week period, mostly in Europe

🔗: woah.org/app/uploads/20…

1/ A human case of #H5N1 was just reported and is linked to the ongoing outbreak in US dairy cattle.

How concerned should we be?

It's good news that the patient is experiencing eye symptoms and had direct exposure to infected cattle.

Why? 🧵

A person in the U.S. has tested positive for #H5N1 bird flu virus after exposure to cows that were presumed to be infected with bird flu viruses. CDC is monitoring the situation & considers the risk to the general public to be low. Read full press release: bit.ly/4aymHmD

1. It looks like #flu season is coming to a close. Things have calmed down considerably since the peak of activity at the end of Dec. A few states are still reporting high #influenza like illness, but most are heading back to off-season levels. Hallelujah. cdc.gov/flu/weekly/

🧪 'Genetic & antigenic characteristics of zoonotic influenza A viruses & development of candidate vaccine viruses for pandemic preparedness'

📄 From 29 Mar 2024 World Health Organization (WHO) Weekly Epidemiological Record

🦠 Covers influenza A(H5), A(H9N2), A(H10), A(H1)v

🔗: iris.who.int/bitstream/hand…

Today World Health Organization (WHO) launched a new network for coronaviruses, CoViNet, to facilitate and coordinate global expertise and capacities for early and accurate detection, monitoring and assessment of #SARSCoV2 , #MERS -CoV and novel CoVs of public health importance.

who.int/news/item/27-0…

📃 UK Health Security Agency #Influenza surveillance update

🗓️ Wk 11 2024 data (11-17 Mar 2024)

📊 Respiratory DataMart System: Influenza positivity ↔️

🏥 Influenza hospitalisation rate: ↔️ & in low impact range

🚑 ICU admission rate: ↔️ & in baseline impact range

🔗: assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/65fc0872…

Wondering which scientific advisory committees and councils and arm’s-length bodies provide science and evidence advice to government and how they are connected? Check out this new map 👇

ℹ️ gov.uk/government/pub…

🗺️ embed.kumu.io/de7376f73bb025…

We have a new big paper out! Led by Cahuantzi PhD with Katrina Lythgoe, Ian Hall and Lorenzo Pellis.

We used novel AI methods to analyse *all* high-coverage COVID viral genomes and look for patterns.

So what did we do and why did we do it? (/1)

pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pn…