Recipient Organization
UNIV OF CALIFORNIA (VET-MED)
(N/A)
DAVIS,CA 95616
Performing Department
MEDICINE AND EPIDEMIOLOGY
Non Technical Summary
The California Department of Food and Agriculture (CDFA), the agency responsible for managing statewide animal health programs, is working with the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Veterinary Services to implement NAIS in California. As NAIS matures, state agencies like CDFA will assume responsibility for the maintenance of the premises registration system, assis with intrastate movement compliance, and continue to serve as a first line of defense during animal health related incidents. These responsibilities demand that CDFA properly plan and budget for future needs of the Department. Through this project proposal, CDFA will assess the effectiveness of current and NAIS type systems for conducting mock disease traceback and traceforward exercises. Simulated disease outbreaks using models that simulate the FMD transmissions are very informative for animal health officials and scientists. These models provide animal health officials information when actual data are unavailable. The information and experience gained from a simulated disease traceability exercise will address several questions raised by animal health officials, livestock producers, and critics about the effectiveness of the NAIS. Using this information, animal health officials and researchers of contagious disease can improve their efforts to properly plan for major disease outbreaks, assess eradication strategies for a contagious disease and document potential costs associated with these events.
Animal Health Component
40%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
20%
Applied
40%
Developmental
40%
Goals / Objectives
This project will address the following problems and questions regarding implementation of NAIS: 1) Can the NAIS ID system be used for the purposes of tracebacks and or traceforwards in the face of a Foot-and-Mouth Disease (FMD) outbreak 2) Is the use of the NAIS animal ID system more efficient in the face of a simulated outbreak of FMD than on farm investigations and paper records at identifying potentially infected premises/animals 3) Can the NAIS ID system and paper records be used in an established FMD simulation model to predict potential disease spread and epidemic duration 4) Which data system is more efficient/accurate in helping to predict the outcome of the FMD outbreak as evaluated by the simulation model 5) What are the resource costs of performing tracebacks and traceforwards under both data systems
Project Methods
FIELD EXERCISES: CDFA and UC Davis will conduct field exercises for a mock FMD disease tracing exercise. Using the simulated exercise, investigators will compare and contrast three categories of disease tracing including: an NAIS-type system with full traceability, a paper-based tracing method, and a mixed system of partial NAIS level tracing and on paper-based methods. During the disease exercise, field staff will m onitor resources (personnel, supplies, etc.) needed to conduct the simulated tracing even tusing the three previously mentioned methods. Additionally, they will monitor and record the number of leads and distinguish the number of informative vs. false leads. CDFA will supply UC Davis with the current tracing data from the Southwest Pilot project to assist with the disease tracing exercise and provide a foundation of actual tracing information. CDFA field staff will execute the disease tracing exercises in collaboration with UC Davis by providing staff to conduct the simulated exercise. The plan for the mock disease tracing exercise will be refined closer to the event date. This plan will involve staff from both UC Davis and CDFA and may require modification to meet the objectives of the project. DISEASE SIMULATIONS: CDFA will provide traceback and traceforward finding for each method tested to CADMS and the data will be entered into a simulation model. Using the available data, UC Davis will conduct simulated FMD disease outbreaks. UC Davis will record the duration of the disease event, the number of premises involved, and the number of infected animals. Each tracing method (e.g., NAIS with full traceability vs. paper records) will be run separately for 1,000 iterations. From these iterations, median, mean and 95% probability intervals will be calculated and the results for epidemic duration and spread for each method will be statistically compared.