Beginning January 2012, a humane method of dog population management using a Catch-Neuter-Vaccinate-Release (CNVR) program was implemented in Dhaka City, Bangladesh as part of the national rabies control program. To enable this program, the size and distribution of the free-roaming dog population needed to be estimated. We present the results of a dog population survey and a pilot assessment of...

Few if any attempts have been made to derive forecasts for the ongoing H1N1 pandemic as extrapolated from knowledge of seasonal influenza. Even simple back-of-the-envelope calculations are lacking. In this note we use first-approximation parameter estimates for the SIR model to compare seasonal and pandemic influenza, and then explore the implications of the existing classical epidemiological t...

The number of asylum seekers arriving in Germany has increased rapidly since 2014 and cases of vaccine-preventable diseases at reception centres were reported. Asylum seekers 12 years and older arriving in Lower Saxony were serologically screened for antibodies against measles, rubella and varicella between November 2014 and October 2015. We calculated the seroprevalence from the screening data...

Bordetella pertussis infection remains an important public health problem worldwide despite decades of routine vaccination. A key indicator of the impact of vaccination programmes is the inter-epidemic period, which is expected to increase with vaccine uptake if there is significant herd immunity. Based on empirical data from 64 countries across the five continents over the past 30-70 years, we...

Public health emergencies are fraught by epistemic uncertainty, which raises policy issues of how to handle that uncertainty and devise sustainable public responses. Among such responses, a herd immunity might be an option. Particularly before the development vaccines, current COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted polarized nature political debate concerning ethical feasibility strategies. This art...