Predicting patterns of pathogen transmission and control in wild chimpanzees

Heterogeneity in host association patterns can alter pathogen transmission and strategies for control. Great apes are highly social and endangered animals that have experienced substantial population declines from directly transmitted pathogens. As such, network approaches to quantify contact heterogeneity could be crucially important for predicting infection probability and outbreak size following pathogen introduction, especially owing to challenges in collecting real-time infection data for endangered wildlife. We use network models and disease simulations to assess how temporal association patterns affect predictions for pathogen transmission and control in a wild chimpanzee community.