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Published on: September 27, 2014
A Metagenomic Biosurveillance Network for Emerging Infectious Diseases: A Simulation-Based Model
Isabel Meusel1, David Manheim1, Oscar Delaney1
1Isabel Meusel, MD, was a Research Fellow, Existential Risk Alliance, Cambridge, United Kingdom; and is now a PhD Researcher, Department of Primary and Long-Term Care, University Medical Center Groningen, Groningen, the Netherlands. David Manheim, PhD, is Director of Policy and Research, Association for Long Term Existence and Resilience (ALTER), Rehovot, Israel; and a Visiting Lecturer, Technion - Israel Institute of Technology, Haifa, Israel. Oscar Delaney is a Research Manager, Existential Risk Alliance, Cambridge, United Kingdom. Daniel Greene, PhD, was a Senior Analyst at Gryphon Scientific, Takoma Park, MD; and is now a Technical Staff member at Mirror Biology Dialogues Fund, New York, NY. Rona Tobolsky is a Researcher, ALTER, Rehovot, Israel; and a Graduate Student, School of Public Health, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel. Hanna Palya was a Research Fellow, Existential Risk Alliance, Cambridge, United Kingdom; and is now a PhD Researcher, Institute for Global Pandemic Planning, University of Warwick, Coventry, United Kingdom. Naham Shapiro, MPH, is a Public Health Lead, ALTER, Rehovot, Israel; and a Research Assistant, School of Public Health, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel. Siddhanth Sharma, MD, MPH, was a Public Health Registrar, Metropolitan Communicable Disease Control Perth, Perth, Australia; and is now a Public Health Specialist, Burnet Institute, Melbourne, Australia.
None:
In this article, we propose a metagenomic next-generation sequencing (mNGS) system for symptomatic clinical respiratory disease samples in Israel to enable detection early enough to contain novel pathogen outbreaks, limit international spread and expedite countermeasure development. We built an open-source, interactive SEIR (susceptible, exposed, infectious, recovered)-based model extending the work of Sharma et al (2023) for 7 representative known respiratory pathogens with pandemic potential, aiming to estimate costs and detection time for the identification of a novel respiratory pathogen in Israel through a network of mNGS monitoring in hospitals. We find that a novel pathogen with SARS-CoV-2-like characteristics could be detected within 68 days (interquartile range [IQR]: 53 to 80) after the first 2 emergency department presentations and 213 (IQR: 94 to 429) total infections across Israel. This surveillance system would cost US$24 million annually over 10 years when implemented in Israel's 6 largest hospitals, covering 37% of the population. Our open-source interactive model allows policymakers and experts to explore different system configurations and their associated tradeoffs between cost, detection speed, and population coverage.
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