Abstract
Rift Valley fever (RVF) is a severe viral zoonosis in Africa and the Middle East that harms both human health and livestock production. It is believed that RVF in Egypt has been repeatedly introduced by the importation of infected animals from Sudan. In this paper, we propose a three-patch model for the process by which animals enter Egypt from Sudan, are moved up the Nile, and then consumed at population centers. The basic reproduction number for each patch is introduced and then the threshold dynamics of the model are established. We simulate an interesting scenario showing a possible explanation of the observed phenomenon of the geographic spread of RVF in Egypt.
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Acknowledgement
We thank two anonymous referees for their valuable comments and suggestions which led to an improvement of our original manuscript. Research was supported by the National Institute of Health (NIH) grant R01GM093345.
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Gao, D., Cosner, C., Cantrell, R.S. et al. Modeling the Spatial Spread of Rift Valley Fever in Egypt. Bull Math Biol 75, 523–542 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-013-9818-5
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11538-013-9818-5