Dr. Fernandez focuses on the transmission of zoonotic diseases within a One Health framework, integrating ecology and epidemiology methods. Her main research interests lie in understanding the transmission of zoonotic diseases as complex socio-ecological systems. Leading community-based participatory research in Latin American and U.S. communities, She her work has focused on integrating data from field studies, encompassing animal and human disease data, along with qualitative and quantitative data from socio-demographic and behavioral studies, and environmental data. Using mathematical, computational, and statistical models, including spatially-explicit ones, She aims to integrate the human and social dimensions of disease transmission. Her work at ForeSITE will be related to adapt scenario modeling of multi-host zoonotic diseases and vector-borne diseases to the regional context, and to provide insights into the appropriate ecological complexity of transmission needed to inform models for decision-making.
Forecasting and Surveillance of Infectious Threats and Epidemics (ForeSITE)
An Insight Net Center for Integration