One challenge facing human health and the environment is the need for better understanding of the processes of viral spillover between wildlife and people. Most often, the domain of interest in viral research is a single pathogen infecting and causing disease in a single host species. But viruses are the most abundant biological entity on the planet, and their ability to co-infect and transmit among species is not well understood or tracked. Ecological forecasting is an emerging field that can deepen understanding and inform decision-making. When applied to viral systems, ecological forecasting can contribute to a more holistic and predictive understanding of viral dynamics, but considerable obstacles to integrate these two fields exist.
In this talk, I evaluate ecological forecasting and the steps needed to achieve informed decision-making regarding environmental viruses. I outline an iterative way to think about ecological forecasting that is founded on sound biological understanding of the system of interest. I then use each step in the forecasting cycle as a lens to examine infection and dispersal of directly transmitted respiratory viruses. Next, I highlight and describe three major obstacles to our current ability to make applicable virological forecasts: 1) data sparsity, 2) event rarity, and 3) unobserved processes. Finally, I suggest feasible ways that ongoing efforts in virus ecology could bridge such gaps and how addressing the specific challenges presented by viruses could have broader implications for the evolving field of ecological forecasting.
