Emerging, vector-borne diseases in a changing European environment Renaud Lancelot (CIRAD) and Guy Hendrickx (Avia-GIS)

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Emerging, vector-borne diseases in a changing
European environmentRenaud Lancelot (CIRAD) and
Guy Hendrickx (Avia-GIS)

• EDEN

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Importance of vector-borne diseases

• Vector-borne diseases are a significant part of
  emerging infectious diseases and their relative
  importance is increasing
• They are highly sensitive to local and global
  environmental changes
• Climate change
• Intensification of commercial exchanges and
  international travels
• Land-cover and land-use changes
• Socio-economic changes

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Jones et al., 2008. Global trends in emerging
infectious diseases. Nature, 451 990-993.
http//dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature06536
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EDEN call (2004)

• The aim is to identify, evaluate and catalogue
  European ecosystems and environmental conditions
  linked to global change, which can influence the
  spatial and temporal distribution and dynamics of
  pathogenic agents.
• A coordinated European approach is needed to
  provide predictive emergence and spread models
  including global and regional prevention, early
  warning, surveillance, and monitoring tools and
  scenarios.
• Coordination with international organizations and
  third-world countries is essential.

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EDEN integrated project

• 24 countries,
• 49 partners,
• 80 scientific teams,
• 120 field sites,
• 60 PhD Students,
• 200 research years

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EDEN integrated project
WP8 Training, Dissemination, Management
Coordination
For each indicator disease, field studies are
conducted to understand patterns and
processes WP1 Landscapes/biotopes WP2
Vectors WP3 Public health WP4 Animal
hosts/reservoirs WP5 Integrated data analysis
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EDEN findings

• A key outcome of EDEN is that many of currently
  observed changes in disease occurrence are driven
  by complex multifactorial causes and can often
  not simply be linked to a single cause.
• Socio-economic factors affecting behavior and
  contacts between hosts, vectors and pathogens
  often appear to be more important drivers of
  change than climatic factors.
• This complexity should not be overlooked in
  disease risk studies and public health policy
  making.

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e.g. Tick-borne encephalitis
Conceptual model and empirical evidence of causes
of spatio-temporal heterogeneity in TBE
epidemiology in Central and Eastern Europe
(Sumilo D, Asokliene L, Bormane A, Vasilenko V,
Golovljova I, Randolph S 2007. PloS ONE, 2 e500)
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EDEN next

• One of the main EDEN assets is to have generated
  a pan-EU network of experts, including an
  extensive PhD network, in research on vectors and
  vector-borne diseases VBD past-present-future.
• The EDEN network is now considered by
  public-health agencies as incontournable on the
  topic of vector-borne diseases.
• This already yielded spin-off projects with ECDC
  and ESA. The EDEN consortium will also coordinate
  replies to upcoming FP7 calls.

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Thank you for your questions

• Welcome at the EDEN International Conference on
  emerging vector-borne disease in a changing
  European Environment
• Montpellier (France), 10-12 May 2010