Epidemiology of Emerging Infectious Disease: Importance of Surveillance and Detection in Public Health Initiatives

Dear Colleagues,

Infectious diseases (IDs) constitute a significant proportion of all known human diseases and have great social, economic, and environmental impacts. The persistent and unpredictable nature of IDs represents a continual challenge, and this is even more exacerbated by the emergence of new, unrecognized pathogens, and the reemergence of old pathogens with renewed or altered virulence.

It is well known that a large proportion of IDs are of zoonotic origin, mostly from wildlife. Various factors at the human–animal–environment interface jointly promote the emergence of IDs, and the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic by SARS-CoV-2 has re-emphasized the key role of this interaction. In addition, a diversified pattern of factors including several human activities and globalization, increase in population density, change in air quality and climate, may interact with the ecology of the microbial habitat.

Vector-borne infectious diseases are the most climate sensitive, and some of these diseases are emerging and/or re-emerging at increasing rates and appearing in new regions, posing considerable public health problems worldwide. Besides host and environmental factors, specific processes such as gene mutation, genetic recombination, or reassortment confer new phenotypic properties which constitute opportunities for infectious agents to evolve, fueling the microbial adaptation to human host and making the spread easier. Another major problem arising from genetic changes is the development of resistance to multiple antimicrobials which has contributed to the re-emergence of many diseases that were no longer considered a public health concern.

The challenging nature of the management of infectious diseases calls for effective constant surveillance strategies and timely identification and control of outbreaks. Epidemiological research and measurement, as well as genomic data collection might provide valuable insights in tracking the source of infection, the transmission route of pathogens in hosts, as well as the prediction and the evaluation of risk factors, which may help to adequately address resources and policies involving preventive measures.

In this exciting context, Pathogens will launch a Special Issue entitled “Epidemiology of Emerging Infectious Disease: Importance of Surveillance and Detection in Public Health Initiatives”. I would like to invite colleagues to submit their manuscripts, in the form of original research and review articles, in the field of emerging and re-emerging pathogenic agents. Potential topics include, but are not limited to:

• Epidemiology;
• Evolution and phylogenetics;
• Genomics;
• Genetics;
• Antimicrobial resistance;
• Public health;
• Vaccine preventive measures;

Prof. Dr. Fabio Tramuto
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. Pathogens is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly 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 2700 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.

• emerging and re-emerging pathogens
• molecular surveillance
• genomics
• antimicrobial resistance
• public health
• vaccines