Exposure Patterns Driving Ebola Transmission in West Africa: A Retrospective Observational Study

Agua-Agum, Junerlyn; Ariyarajah, Archchun; Aylward, Bruce; Bawo, Luke; Bilivogui, Pepe; Blake, Isobel M.; Brennan, Richard J.; Cawthorne, Amy; Cleary, Eilish; Clement, Peter; Conteh, Roland; Cori, Anne; Dafae, Foday; Dahl, Benjamin; Dangou, Jean-Marie; Diallo, Boubacar; Donnelly, Christl A.; Dorigatti, Ilaria; Dye, Christopher; Eckmanns, Tim; Fallah, Mosoka; Ferguson, Neil M.; Fiebig, Lena; Fraser, Christophe; Garske, Tini; Gonzalez, Lice; Hamblion, Esther; Hamid, Nuha; Hersey, Sara; Hinsley, Wes; Jambei, Amara; Jombart, Thibaut; Kargbo, David; Keita, Sakoba; Kinzer, Michael; George, Fred Kuti; Godefroy, Beatrice; Gutierrez, Giovanna; Kannangarage, Niluka; Mills, Harriet L.; Moller, Thomas; Meijers, Sascha; Mohamed, Yasmine; Morgan, Oliver; Nedjati-Gilani, Gemma; Newton, Emily; Nouvellet, Pierre; Nyenswah, Tolbert; Perea, William; Perkins, Devin; Riley, Steven; Rodier, Guenael; Rondy, Marc; Sagrado, Maria; Savulescu, Camelia; Schafer, Ilana J.; Schumacher, Dirk; Seyler, Thomas; Shah, Anita; Van Kerkhove, Maria D.; Wesseh, C. Samford; Yoti, Zabulon

In summary, the objectives of these analyses are to understand the drivers of local transmission, the timing of transmission events relative to clinical timelines, and the characteristics of Total number of confirmed and probable cases by week is shown in the top row. Percentage of cases who reported a non-funeral exposure (triangles) or a funeral exposure (circles) is shown in the second row. The shaded regions represent the 95% confidence intervals around the proportions. Note that cases can report more than one exposure, and so percentages need not add to 100%. exp., exposure. the transmission network. These are different from and complement the objectives of our previous papers [11] [12] [13] [14] . However, aspects of the process are the same as in those previous analyses: data cleaning, time series of incidence, and method of estimation for the reproduction number. The same exposure data were used to estimate the incubation period and serial interval in previous analyses [11, 12] . The dataset analysed is the most comprehensive available on the current epidemic, and represents a unique resource with which to increase our understanding of the outbreak and of Ebola transmission in general. The analysis and presentation of the characteristics of exposures, transmission network, transmission risks, characteristics of potential transmitters and multiple transmitters, health care worker (HCW) exposures, and correlations between epidemic growth and behaviour are all novel.