Abstract
We investigate the spread of American foulbrood (AFB), a disease caused by the bacterium Paenibacillus larvae, that affects bees and can be extremely damaging to beehives. Our dataset comes from an inspection period carried out during an AFB epidemic of honeybee colonies on the island of Jersey during the summer of 2010. The data include the number of hives of honeybees, location and owner of honeybee apiaries across the island. We use a spatial SIR model with an underlying owner network to simulate the epidemic and characterize the epidemic using a Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) scheme to determine model parameters and infection times (including undetected ‘occult’ infections). Likely methods of infection spread can be inferred from the analysis, with both distance- and owner-based transmissions being found to contribute to the spread of AFB. The results of the MCMC are corroborated by simulating the epidemic using a stochastic SIR model, resulting in aggregate levels of infection that are comparable to the data. We use this stochastic SIR model to simulate the impact of different control strategies on controlling the epidemic. It is found that earlier inspections result in smaller epidemics and a higher likelihood of AFB extinction.
Highlights
Bees contribute immensely to agriculture through crop pollination
For a detailed breakdown for the set-up and components which make up the Markov chain Monte Carlo (MCMC) scheme, along with the resulting plots, see appendix A.5.; in §3, we present the main findings of our analysis of the Jersey data
For each of the following methods, we use the spatial SIR model, begin with an infection at one hive, and allow the disease to spread while imposing whatever control measures we choose
Summary
Bees contribute immensely to agriculture through crop pollination. A recent report indicated that 71 out of 100 important crop species are bee-pollinated [1]. The Varroa parasite (Varroa destructor), along with a host of bacterial pathogens such as European foulbrood (EFB) and American foulbrood (AFB) [6,7], parasitic insects such as the small hive beetle [8,9,10] and Tropilaelaps mite [11] and viruses such as the Kashmir bee virus [9,10] and the Israeli acute paralysis virus [12], have all been implicated in honeybee colony loss Such losses have led to reduced pollination leading to lower crop yields, such as almonds in California [13]. A suite of simulated control strategies are implemented to compare plausible methods for eliminating or limiting the spread of future AFB outbreaks
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