Preliminary estimation of the basic reproduction number of Zika virus infection during Colombia epidemic, 2015-2016

Abstract

After 2014–2015 chikungunya virus (CHIKV) spread in the Americas [1], as one of consequences of the wide distribution of Aedes spp in the region, Zika virus (ZIKV) appeared in Brazil and later in more than 30 territories in the region [2]. Following Brazil, Colombia is the second earliest country that experienced a large-scale ZIKV epidemic in Latin America, 2015. In Colombia, laboratory-based and syndromic surveillance have been underway to capture the epidemic dynamics since its start of the epidemic in 2015 [3]. The transmission potential of ZIKV has been measured by the basic reproduction number, R0, interpreted as the average number of secondary human cases generated by a single human case through the mosquito vector [4]. The R0 has been estimated to range from 2 to 5 in South Pacific countries [4]. Nevertheless, the transmissibility in the South American setting has yet to be reported. Here we present our modeling result from an analysis of Colombian epidemiological data.