Determinants of the spatiotemporal dynamics of the 2009 H1N1 pandemic in Europe: implications for real-time modelling.

ABSTRACT: Influenza pandemics in the last century were characterized by successive waves and differences in impact and timing between different regions, for reasons not clearly understood. The 2009 H1N1 pandemic showed rapid global spread, but with substantial heterogeneity in timing within each hemisphere. Even within Europe substantial variation was observed, with the UK being unique in experiencing a major first wave of transmission in early summer and all other countries having a single major epidemic in the autumn/winter, with a West to East pattern of spread. Here we show that a microsimulation model, parameterised using data about H1N1pdm collected by the beginning of June 2009, explains the occurrence of two waves in UK and a single wave in the rest of Europe as a consequence of timing of H1

SUBMITTER: Merler S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC3182874 | biostudies-literature | 2011 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature