Poster: Epidemiology: Risk Assessment
680-P
Modeling regulatory decisions in response to exotic pest detections: Pest case studies for decision makers
L. BROWN (1), L. Brown (1) (1) APHIS Plant Protection & Quarantine, Science & Technology, U.S.A.
Detections of exotic pest require responses from decision makers. Response options include management actions such as: eradication, containment, localized control, or the decision to not implement a program. When uncertainty is high, situational context can drive decision-making, leading to responses that are counter intuitive to epidemiological principles of infectivity, symptom expression, and pathogen spread. Spatially explicit models like Webidemics or spatially implicit models like ExPAT are used to model outcomes of decisions, reducing the reliance on highly uncertain information. These tools are applied based on the situation presented by the particular case study. Based on multiple case studies of all pathogen groups, we will present a matrix highlighting for decision-makers which tools are best suited for different exotic pest detections. In the future, the selection and parameterization of proper tools will supply decision makers with quantitative data to evaluate exotic pest detections.