Professor Corey Bradshaw, Director of Ecological Modelling at The Environment Institute, and colleagues have recently evaluated freely available software tools that provide a realistic prediction of the spread of disease among animals. In particular, they used a combination of models to look at the possible spread of tuberculosis (TB) among feral water buffalo in the Northern Territory.

Professor Corey Bradshaw

Professor Bradshaw says Australia needs to implement tools such as those combining disease and population models to help plan the response to any potential return of TB – or other, nastier diseases, such as foot-and mouth and that much more could be done to predict the likelihood and spread of serious disease in Australian wildlife and commercial stock.

Read the full University of Adelaide media release here.

The team’s work has been published in the Journal of Applied Ecology.