Arbovirus Infection

A special issue of Epidemiologia (ISSN 2673-3986).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 August 2021) | Viewed by 3053

Special Issue Editor


E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
1. Department of Virology, Department of Tropical Viral Vaccine Development, Institute of Tropical Medicine, Nagasaki University, Nagasaki 852-8523, Japan
2. Center for Vaccines and Therapeutic Antibodies for Emerging Infectious Diseases, Shimane University, Izumo 690-8504, Japan
Interests: dengue virus; zika virus; chikungunya virus; serology; molecular epidemiology
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Arboviruses—arthropod-borne viruses—are globally emerging and reemerging pathogens that are important causes of human disease throughout the world. Arboviruses are transmitted biologically among vertebrate by hematophagous arthropods, including mosquitoes, ticks, sandflies, and biting midges. Arboviruses include a wide variety of RNA viruses, and members of the Flavivirus and Togavirus genera are the most important arboviruses that cause diseases in humans. Examples include four dengue viruses (DENV), Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV), West Nile virus (WNV), Zika virus (ZIKV), Yellow Fever virus (YFV), tick-borne encephalitis virus (TBEV), and Chikungunya virus (CHIKV).With the recent outbreak of DENV, YFV, ZIKV, and CHIKV infections, the interest in arbovirus has increased. To develop vaccines and specific therapeutic treatments, it is necessary to determine the viral and host factors enhancing arbovirus infection.

In this Special Issue, we aim to assemble a collection of research papers and reviews that consider serological aspects, molecular features of arboviruses, virus­–host interactions, and viral pathogenesis in animal models to promote the discovery of antiviral drugs and vaccine development. We look forward to your submissions.

Dr. Mya Myat Ngwe Tun
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Epidemiologia is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Published Papers (1 paper)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

11 pages, 2107 KiB  
Article
Quantifying Media Effects, Its Content, and Role in Promoting Community Awareness of Chikungunya Epidemic in Bangladesh
by Mst. Marium Begum, Osman Ulvi, Ajlina Karamehic-Muratovic, Mallory R. Walsh, Hasan Tarek, Jailos Lubinda, Alfonso J. Rodriguez-Morales, Shehzad Sarfraz, Jesús A. Treviño C, Muhammad Yousaf Shad and Ubydul Haque
Epidemiologia 2021, 2(1), 84-94; https://doi.org/10.3390/epidemiologia2010008 - 5 Mar 2021
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2510
Abstract
Background: Chikungunya is a vector-borne disease, mostly present in tropical and subtropical regions. The virus is spread by Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus mosquitos and symptoms include high fever to severe joint pain. Dhaka, Bangladesh, suffered an outbreak of chikungunya in 2017 lasting [...] Read more.
Background: Chikungunya is a vector-borne disease, mostly present in tropical and subtropical regions. The virus is spread by Ae. aegypti and Ae. albopictus mosquitos and symptoms include high fever to severe joint pain. Dhaka, Bangladesh, suffered an outbreak of chikungunya in 2017 lasting from April to September. With the goal of reducing cases, social media was at the forefront during this outbreak and educated the public about symptoms, prevention, and control of the virus. Popular web-based sources such as the top dailies in Bangladesh, local news outlets, and Facebook spread awareness of the outbreak. Objective: This study sought to investigate the role of social and mainstream media during the chikungunya epidemic. The study objective was to determine if social media can improve awareness of and practice associated with reducing cases of chikungunya. Methods: We collected chikungunya-related information circulated from the top nine television channels in Dhaka, Bangladesh, airing from 1st April–20th August 2017. All the news published in the top six dailies in Bangladesh were also compiled. The 50 most viewed chikungunya-related Bengali videos were manually coded and analyzed. Other social media outlets, such as Facebook, were also analyzed to determine the number of chikungunya-related posts and responses to these posts. Results: Our study showed that media outlets were associated with reducing cases of chikungunya, indicating that media has the potential to impact future outbreaks of these alpha viruses. Each media outlet (e.g., web, television) had an impact on the human response to an individual’s healthcare during this outbreak. Conclusions: To prevent future outbreaks of chikungunya, media outlets and social media can be used to educate the public regarding prevention strategies such as encouraging safe travel, removing stagnant water sources, and assisting with tracking cases globally to determine where future outbreaks may occur. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Arbovirus Infection)
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop