Determinants of variation in epidemiological parameters for African Swine Fever virus

Abstract

African Swine Fever (ASF) is a highly infectious reportable disease of swine that can have devastating consequences for pork producers and consumers. ASF virus can persist in either domestic or wild swine through several epidemiological cycles. This has led to a wide variety of epidemiological traits, making it challenging to plan effective surveillance and mitigation strategies. Here, we compile and analyze data from experimental infections of ASF virus variants from genotype II that have been reported in peer-reviewed publications. We provide descriptive summaries of the distributions of epidemiological parameters such as incubation period, infectious period, mortality rate, and R0 and develop predictive models that explain the variation in these quantities based on detection assays and other experimental design features. Our results provide a comprehensive perspective of estimates of epidemiological parameters for ASFV, allowing for increased transparency in accounting for parameter uncertainty in ASF preparedness modeling. Our meta-analysis also provides insight on knowledge gaps and study design issues that could be addressed by future experimentation.