Key Laboratory of Wildlife Diseases and Biosecurity Management of Heilongjiang Province, Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, P. R. China.
College of Wildlife and Protected Area, Northeast Forestry University, Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, P. R. China.
PLoS One. 2024 Oct 22;19(10):e0311936. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0311936. eCollection 2024.
This paper looks into the MaxEnt model in a trial to comprehend the ecological and environmental conditions that propagate and drive the spread of Ebola Virus Disease in Africa. We use the MaxEnt model to assess risk determinants associated with the occurrence and distribution of EVD, taking into account non-correlated variables such as neighborhood mean temperature, rainfall, and human population density. Our findings indicate that among the factors that significantly shape the geographical distribution of EVD risk are human population density, annual rainfall, temperature variability, and seasonality. The model used is both reliable and accurate (the average value for training AUC was 0.987); it can be used as a valuable approach for the prediction of infectious disease outbreaks. High-risk areas are primarily identified in the western and central regions of Africa, with some of the others in the east also vulnerable. This further calls for specified public health interventions and enhanced surveillance in specified hotspots, contributing to global efforts to predict and mitigate risks associated with EVD outbreaks more adequately. The findings further support that it remains imperative to conduct additional research, including socio-economic and cultural variables, to enhance the understanding of how environmental factors contribute to the emergence and transmission of Ebola.
本文探讨了最大熵模型，旨在了解在非洲传播和驱动埃博拉病毒病（Ebola Virus Disease，EVD）的生态和环境条件。我们使用最大熵模型来评估与 EVD 发生和分布相关的风险决定因素，同时考虑到非相关变量，如邻近平均温度、降雨量和人口密度。我们的研究结果表明，影响 EVD 风险地理分布的主要因素包括人口密度、年降雨量、温度变异性和季节性。所使用的模型可靠且准确（训练 AUC 的平均值为 0.987）；它可以作为一种预测传染病爆发的有价值的方法。高风险地区主要集中在非洲的西部和中部，东部的一些地区也较为脆弱。这进一步需要在特定的热点地区进行特定的公共卫生干预和加强监测，以促进全球更充分地预测和减轻与 EVD 爆发相关的风险。研究结果进一步表明，必须进行更多的研究，包括社会经济和文化变量，以增强对环境因素如何促成埃博拉病毒的出现和传播的理解。
