This Research Topic is Volume 2 in the Emerging Infectious and Vector-Borne Diseases: A Global Challenge series:
Emerging Infectious and Vector-Borne Diseases: A Global ChallengeIn recent years, with the increase in global travel, interaction, and climate change, the distinctions between domestic and global diseases have become difficult to ascertain. This Research Topic will describe Emerging Infectious Diseases (including re-emerging infectious diseases) and Vector Borne Diseases linked to this globalization and climate change. The on-going COVID-19 pandemic is the archetypical example of the rapid globalization of an emerging zoonotic virus. Global climate change has also blurred the classical niche demarcations for vectors such as mosquitoes, which are able to carry diseases such as Zika and Dengue, as these invasive species have been found further north of their past territories.
Therefore, this Research Topic will focus on global challenges in the identification, transfer, spread, treatment and containment of such diseases and new outbreaks. It will include but not be limited to the following topics:
• Increases in population, travel, urbanization, and population density: With an increase in globalization and refugee/immigrant populations, researchers have seen and anticipate more re-emerging diseases. The same can be possibly observed for emerging diseases for crowded/enclosed conditions that occur when traveling and in refugee/immigrant migration situations. Closer contact with zoonotic vectors induced by the ever increasing population density in some areas also enters this category.
• Sustaining bacteria, viruses and fungi in the environment: As more and more immunocompromised patients (e.g. due to organ transplant, HIV/AIDS, use of immunosuppressant therapies, etc.) are able to thrive with the advances in modern medicine and technology, there are also more opportunities for these pathogens to become infectious agents or opportunistic.
• The “edge effect” and the transfer of viruses, bacteria, fungi, and other parasites: The spread of pathogens via this globalization (travel, climate change, etc.) such as viruses (Avian Influenza, Thogotovirus, Heartland Virus, Influenza A Virus, Zika, Ebola, MERS-CoV, BK virus, Mumps, and Measles, and the now famous SARS-CoV2 to name a few), bacteria (Borrelia miyamotoi, Borrelia burgdorferi, Bacillus cereus, Mycobacterium chimaera, Mycobacterium intracellulare, Carbapenem-resistant Acinetobacter baumannii, Pseudomonas aeruginosa, and enterobacteria, Vancomycin-resistant Enterococcus faecium, Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus), fungi (Cryptococcus, Histoplasma and Candida auris), vector-borne and zoonotic diseases (SARS-CoV2, Zika Virus, Malaria, Lyme Disease, Cryptosporidiosis, West Nile Virus, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, and Rabies), and parasites (Plasmodium and Schistosoma).
We therefore welcome manuscripts that deal with the spread of the above and other pathogens via globalization.