Course Description
The spread and control of infectious diseases taking a population level and dynamical systems approach.
Athena Title
Systems Infectious Disease Epi
Prerequisite
BIOS 7010 or BIOS 7010E or permission of department
Grading System
A - F (Traditional)
Course Objectives
Students will be able to: -Explain and compute important epidemiological measures, such as reproductive number and level of herd immunity -Appraise the fundamentally causal nature of mechanistic infectious disease (ID) computer models and master the use of such models to address important ID epidemiology research questions -Interpret the meaning of specific dynamic patterns seen in ID incidence and prevalence -Choose optimal ID intervention strategies based on features of specific IDs -Predict the impact of different ID intervention strategies -Critically evaluate the ID epidemiology literature -Compare and assess the strengths and weaknesses of different ID data collection and analysis approaches -Formulate meaningful ID epidemiology research questions of public health importance -Select the appropriate data collection and analysis approach for a specific ID research question -Explain the importance of system dynamical thinking for the study and control of ID
Topical Outline
-Introduction to infectious disease (ID) dynamics -Introduction to computer-based ID models -The concept of reproductive number and herd immunity -The impact and dynamics of vaccination The impact of quarantine and other public health interventions -The differences between medical status and infectious status and how it affects transmission and interventions -The impact of population demography on ID dynamics -Endemic states and disease extinctions -Oscillations and seasonality -The role of core groups and super-spreaders for the transmission of ID -The impact of immunity and waning immunity of ID dynamics -Different forms of direct disease transmission -The impact of environmental transmission on ID dynamics -Vector-borne ID transmission dynamics -Multi-host ID transmission dynamics and population heterogeneity -Age structure and its impact on ID dynamics -The importance of contact network structure for the transmission of certain ID -Evolutionary dynamics as a response to interventions (drugs, vaccines, etc.) -The role of spatial structure for ID dynamics -Multi-pathogen ID transmission dynamics *******NOTES********* -This course will make use of computer models, but it will not teach the building and analysis of such models. -This course does not cover the clinical and basic epidemiological characteristics of specific diseases.