Evaluating human mobility patterns, seroepidemology, and environmental sampling to prevent & respond to emerging and re-emerging pathogens

Due to many related sociopolitical, demographic, and environmental factors, Canada and the world is seeing an increasing frequency of large-scale infectious disease outbreaks, which we are currently ill prepared to handle. Improved regional and global coordination and capacity building is needed. This proposal aims to study how to best harness three key components, with the ultimate goal of enabling policymakers and communities better prepare, detect, and respond to infections of epidemic and pandemic potential. 1) Human mobility: We will harness global human mobility data to predict the spread of emerging infections by evaluating global and regional flight data. This technology has capacity rapidly evaluate and identify regional and global risks of importing emerging infections. To study this, we will evaluate the potential spread of Oropouche virus from Brazil by harnessing human mobility data and modelling other variables such as climate and suitable insect vectors. 2) Population immunity to infection: We will evaluate the prevalence of emerging infections in a population, and how infections in communities change over time through serology on dried blood spots (DBS). We will study mpox with this approach, and with only a small drop of blood from participants, we will evaluate population-level exposures. Repeat sampling will determine transmission dynamics over time, providing essential data to help drive policy decisions, such as screening, vaccination, or other control initiatives. 3) Environmental sampling: We will evaluate the sampling the environment and water sources through a novel approach ("phages") for emerging infections. This is an inexpensive and effective method to rapidly identify pathogens circulating in a community even before a larger outbreak occurs and can better inform citizens and policymakers to appropriately respond to emerging infectious threats. We will study drug resistant typhoid using this approach.