title: The nexus between forest fragmentation in Africa and Ebola virus disease outbreaks.
abstract: Tropical forests are undergoing land use change in many regions of the world, including the African continent. Human populations living close to forest margins fragmented and disturbed by deforestation may be particularly exposed to zoonotic infections because of the higher likelihood for humans to be in contact with disease reservoirs. Quantitative analysis of the nexus between deforestation and the emergence of Ebola virus disease (EVD), however, is still missing. Here we use land cover change data in conjunction with EVD outbreak records to investigate the association between recent (2004-2014) outbreaks in West and Central Africa, and patterns of land use change in the region. We show how in these EVD outbreaks the index cases in humans (i.e. spillover from wildlife reservoirs) occurred mostly in hotspots of forest fragmentation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy.
authors.forename: Maria Cristina
authors.initials: MC
authors.lastname: Rulli
authors.affiliation: Division on Impacts on Agriculture, Forests and Ecosystem Services, Fondazione Centro Euro-Mediterraneo sui Cambiamenti Climatici, Viterbo, Italy.
authors.forename: Monia
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Santini
authors.affiliation: Molecular Epidemiology and Public Health Laboratory (mEpiLab), Hopkirk Research Institute, Massey University, Private Bag 11 222, Palmerston North 4442, New Zealand.
authors.forename: David T S
authors.initials: DT
authors.lastname: Hayman
authors.affiliation: Department of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA, USA.|Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.|National Social Environmental Synthesis Center, University of Maryland, Annapolis, MD, USA.
authors.forename: Paolo
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: D'Odorico
mesh_terms: D000349:Africa / Q000453:epidemiology; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D004196:Disease Outbreaks; D029043:Ebolavirus; D065928:Forests; D005843:Geography; D019142:Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000635:transmission* / Q000821:virology; D006801:Humans; D019279:Resin Cements; D063809:Satellite Imagery; D012621:Seasons
chemical_list: C433206:Nexus; D019279:Resin Cements