Διερεύνηση του εφικτού για τη μετατροπή παλαιών σιδηροδρομικών γραμμών σε διαδρομές περιπάτου και ποδηλάτου. Η περίπτωση Αγ. Ανάργυροι - Λαύριο.

Εθνικό Μετσόβιο Πολυτεχνείο--Μεταπτυχιακή Εργασία. Διεπιστημονικό-Διατμηματικό Πρόγραμμα Μεταπτυχιακών Σπουδών (Δ.Π.Μ.Σ.) “Γεωπληροφορική

Exploring the fate of cattle herds with inconclusive reactors to the tuberculin skin test

Bovine tuberculosis (TB) is an important animal health issue in many parts of the world. In England and Wales, the primary test to detect infected animals is the single intradermal comparative cervical tuberculin test, which compares immunological responses to bovine and avian tuberculins. Inconclusive test reactors (IRs) are animals that demonstrate a positive reaction to the bovine tuberculin only marginally greater than the avian reaction, so are not classified as reactors and immediately removed. In the absence of reactors in the herd, IRs are isolated, placed under movement restrictions and re-tested after 60 days. Other animals in these herds at the time of the IR result are not usually subject to movement restrictions. This could affect efforts to control TB if undetected infected cattle move out of those herds before the next TB test. To improve our understanding of the importance of IRs, this study aimed to assess whether median survival time and the hazard of a subsequent TB incident differs in herds with only IRs detected compared with negative-testing herds. Survival analysis and extended Cox regression were used, with herds entering the study on the date of the first whole herd test in 2012. An additional analysis was performed using an alternative entry date to try to remove the impact of IR retesting and is presented in the Supplementary Material. Survival analysis showed that the median survival time among IR only herds was half that observed for clear herds (2.1 years and 4.2 years respectively; p < 0.001). Extended Cox regression analysis showed that IR-only herds had 2.7 times the hazard of a subsequent incident compared with negative-testing herds in year one (hazard ratio: 2.69; 95% CI: 2.54, 2.84; p < 0.001), and that this difference in the hazard reduced by 63% per year. After 2.7 years the difference had disappeared. The supplementary analysis supported these findings showing that IR only herds still had a greater hazard of a subsequent incident after the IR re-test, but that the effect was reduced. This emphasizes the importance of careful decision making around the management of IR animals and indicates that re-testing alone may not be sufficient to reduce the risk posed by IR only herds in England and Wales

Herd-level risk factors of bovine tuberculosis in England and Wales after the 2001 foot-and-mouth disease epidemic

We present the results of a 2005 case–control study of bovine tuberculosis (bTB) breakdowns in English and Welsh herds. The herd management, farming practices, and environmental factors of 401matched pairs of case and control herds were investigated to provide a picture of herd-level risk factors in areas of varying bTB incidence. A global conditional logistic regression model, with region-specific variants, was used to compare case herds that had experienced a confirmed bTB breakdown to contemporaneous control herds matched on region, herd type, herd size, and parish testing interval. Contacts with cattle from contiguous herds and sourcing cattle from herds with a recent history of bTB were associated with an increased risk in both the global and regional analyses. Operating a farm over several premises, providing cattle feed inside the housing, and the presence of badgers were also identified as significantly associated with an increased bTB risk. Steps taken to minimize cattle contacts with neighboring herds and altering trading practices could have the potential to reduce the size of the bTB epidemic. In principle, limiting the interactions between cattle and wildlife may also be useful; however this study did not highlight any specific measures to implement

Identifying genotype specific elevated-risk areas and associated herd risk factors for bovine tuberculosis spread in British cattle

Bovine tuberculosis (bTB) is a chronic zoonosis with major health and economic impact on the cattle industry. Despite extensive control measures in cattle and culling trials in wildlife, the reasons behind the expansion of areas with high incidence of bTB breakdowns in Great Britain remain unexplained. By balancing the importance of cattle movements and local transmission on the observed pattern of cattle outbreaks, we identify areas at elevated risk of infection from specific Mycobacterium bovis genotypes. We show that elevated-risk areas (ERAs) were historically more extensive than previously understood, and that cattle movements alone are insufficient for ERA spread, suggesting the involvement of other factors. For all genotypes, we find that, while the absolute risk of infection is higher in ERAs compared to areas with intermittent risk, the statistically significant risk factors are remarkably similar in both, suggesting that these risk factors can be used to identify incipient ERAs before this is indicated by elevated incidence alone. Our findings identify research priorities for understanding bTB dynamics, improving surveillance and guiding management to prevent further ERA expansion

The Effect of Badger Culling on Breakdown Prolongation and Recurrence of Bovine Tuberculosis in Cattle Herds in Great Britain

Abstract Bovine tuberculosis is endemic in cattle herds in Great Britain, with a substantial economic impact. A reservoir of Mycobacterium bovis within the Eurasian badger (Meles meles) population is thought to have hindered disease control. Cattle herd incidents, termed breakdowns, that are either &apos;prolonged&apos; (lasting $240 days) or &apos;recurrent&apos; (with another breakdown within a specified time period) may be important foci for onward spread of infection. They drain veterinary resources and can be demoralising for farmers. Randomised Badger Culling Trial (RBCT) data were re-analysed to examine the effects of two culling strategies on breakdown prolongation and recurrence, during and after culling, using a Bayesian hierarchical model. Separate effect estimates were obtained for the &apos;core&apos; trial areas (where culling occurred) and the &apos;buffer&apos; zones (up to 2 km outside of the core areas). For breakdowns that started during the culling period, &apos;reactive&apos; (localised) culling was associated with marginally increased odds of prolongation, with an odds ratio (OR) of 1.7 (95% credible interval [CI] 1.1-2.4) within the core areas. This effect was not present after the culling ceased. There was no notable effect of &apos;proactive&apos; culling on prolongation. In contrast, reactive culling had no effect on breakdown recurrence, though there was evidence of a reduced risk of recurrence in proactive core areas during the culling period (ORs and 95% CIs: 0.82 (0.64-1.0) and 0.69 (0.54-0.86) for 24-and 36-month recurrence respectively). Again these effects were not present after the culling ceased. There seemed to be no effect of culling on breakdown prolongation or recurrence in the buffer zones. These results suggest that the RBCT badger culling strategies are unlikely to reduce either the prolongation or recurrence of breakdowns in the long term, and that reactive strategies (such as employed during the RBCT) are, if anything, likely to impact detrimentally on breakdown persistence

Cyclurban - A lessons learned report

The lessons learned report summarizes the findings of the project „Cycling as an element of urban climate mitigation policy (Cyclurban)”. The project advance cycling as a measure for sustainable urban mobility and climate mitigation on a local level. In particular, the project researched the situation and developed measures to strengthen cycling mobility in the areas infrastructure, policy and planning, services and promotion, also taking into account new developments such as e-bikes and cargo bikes. The project consortium covered seven EU countries (Germany, Estonia, Latvia, Poland, Croatia, Greece, Slovakia). The report is available in seven languages

Coupling models of cattle and farms with models of badgers for predicting the dynamics of bovine tuberculosis (TB)

Bovine TB is a major problem for the agricultural industry in several countries. TB can be contracted and spread by species other than cattle and this can cause a problem for disease control. In the UK and Ireland, badgers are a recognised reservoir of infection and there has been substantial discussion about potential control strategies. We present a coupling of individual based models of bovine TB in badgers and cattle, which aims to capture the key details of the natural history of the disease and of both species at approximately county scale. The model is spatially explicit it follows a very large number of cattle and badgers on a different grid size for each species and includes also winter housing. We show that the model can replicate the reported dynamics of both cattle and badger populations as well as the increasing prevalence of the disease in cattle. Parameter space used as input in simulations was swept out using Latin hypercube sampling and sensitivity analysis to model outputs was conducted using mixed effect models. By exploring a large and computationally intensive parameter space we show that of the available control strategies it is the frequency of TB testing and whether or not winter housing is practised that have the most significant effects on the number of infected cattle, with the effect of winter housing becoming stronger as farm size increases. Whether badgers were culled or not explained about 5%, while the accuracy of the test employed to detect infected cattle explained less than 3% of the variance in the number of infected cattle

Combining genomics and epidemiology to analyse bi-directional transmission of mycobacterium bovis in a multi-host system

Quantifying pathogen transmission in multi-host systems is difficult, as exemplified in bovine tuberculosis (bTB) systems, but is crucial for control. The agent of bTB, Mycobacterium bovis, persists in cattle populations worldwide, often where potential wildlife reservoirs exist. However, the relative contribution of different host species to bTB persistence is generally unknown. In Britain, the role of badgers in infection persistence in cattle is highly contentious, despite decades of research and control efforts. We applied Bayesian phylogenetic and machine-learning approaches to bacterial genome data to quantify the roles of badgers and cattle in M. bovis infection dynamics in the presence of data biases. Our results suggest that transmission occurs more frequently from badgers to cattle than vice versa (10.4x in the most likely model) and that within-species transmission occurs at higher rates than between-species transmission for both. If representative, our results suggest that control operations should target both cattle and badgers

Whole Genome Sequencing Reveals Local Transmission Patterns of Mycobacterium bovis in Sympatric Cattle and Badger Populations

Whole genome sequencing (WGS) technology holds great promise as a tool for the forensic epidemiology of bacterial pathogens. It is likely to be particularly useful for studying the transmission dynamics of an observed epidemic involving a largely unsampled &lsquo;reservoir' host, as for bovine tuberculosis (bTB) in British and Irish cattle and badgers. BTB is caused by Mycobacterium bovis, a member of the M. tuberculosis complex that also includes the aetiological agent for human TB. In this study, we identified a spatio-temporally linked group of 26 cattle and 4 badgers infected with the same Variable Number Tandem Repeat (VNTR) type of M. bovis. Single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) between sequences identified differences that were consistent with bacterial lineages being persistent on or near farms for several years, despite multiple clear whole herd tests in the interim. Comparing WGS data to mathematical models showed good correlations between genetic divergence and spatial distance, but poor correspondence to the network of cattle movements or within-herd contacts. Badger isolates showed between zero and four SNP differences from the nearest cattle isolate, providing evidence for recent transmissions between the two hosts. This is the first direct genetic evidence of M. bovis persistence on farms over multiple outbreaks with a continued, ongoing interaction with local badgers. However, despite unprecedented resolution, directionality of transmission cannot be inferred at this stage. Despite the often notoriously long timescales between time of infection and time of sampling for TB, our results suggest that WGS data alone can provide insights into TB epidemiology even where detailed contact data are not available, and that more extensive sampling and analysis will allow for quantification of the extent and direction of transmission between cattle and badgers