Quantification of foot-and-mouth disease virus transmission rates using published data

Foot-and-mouth disease is an extremely infectious and devastating disease affecting all species of cloven-hoofed animals. To understand the epidemiology of the causative virus and predict viral transmission dynamics, quantified transmission parameters are essential to decision makers and modellers alike. However, such quantified parameters are scarcely available, and recently a series of animal experiments was set up to obtain such data experimentally. In this communication, however, we report on the use of data from an animal experiment conducted 10 years ago to quantify transmission of foot-and-mouth disease virus between non-vaccinated sheep and from sub-clinically infected sheep to in-contact pigs. This new analysis utilises a state-of-the-art Generalised Linear Model to estimate the transmission rate. From the obtained results it is concluded that meta-analysis of "old" experiments using newly developed techniques can provide useful data to replace, reduce and refine future foot-and-mouth disease transmission experiments, thereby minimising animal suffering for research purposes.