IDDconf 2023

A Conference on Infectious Disease Dynamics.

Welcome

IDDconf 2023 is back after a pandemic hiatus! IDDconf 2023 is the fourth instalment of a new meeting series focussing on innovative research in infectious disease dynamics.

This meeting is an opportunity for infectious disease modellers to share new ideas, in-progress research, and build an open and collaborative network of scientists.

Concurrent updates on this website and on twitter @IDDconf.

More details

Date: Tuesday 5^th September — Thursday 7^th September 2023
Location: Ambleside Campus (University of Cumbria), Ambleside, Cumbria, UK
Start time: (9am if attending workshops) 12:30pm Tuesday
End time: 2:30pm Thursday
Reception: Tuesday 6—7.30pm
Country Walk: Wednesday 2—6pm

2.5 days of interaction within the infectious disease modelling community
High presentation ratio amongst participants
New and developing research encouraged
Afternoon of walking in beautiful Lake District countryside (optional)
Optional workshop sessions on day 1

Topics include any aspects of infectious disease dynamics: from methodological to applied modelling of emerging, epidemic and endemic infectious diseases, including epidemiology, phylodynamics, evolutionary biology and ecology.

We are aiming for the meeting to be as informal and family-friendly as possible. Please see the family section for more information.

Format: single-stream of short talks (~15 mins) by most attendees (numbers permitting), with a small poster session during evening reception.

Inclusions in Standard Conference Ticket

2 nights single en-suite accommodation at University of Cumbria halls
Vegetarian lunches, coffee, and snacks
Nibbles, wine, and soft drinks at evening reception
Subsidised childcare for those bringing small children
Please note, that due to renovation at Ambleside, there are fewer tickets with accommodation than in previous years

Exclusions

Transport to Ambleside
Alcohol (except at reception)
Breakfast*
Dinner

Workshops

2 parallel morning workshops on inference methods Tuesday 9am – 12.30pm
See Workshops for more details

Cost

Conference with accommodation: £210
- 12.30pm Tuesday 5^th — 2.30pm Thursday 7^th September
Conference without accommodation: £140
- 12.30pm Tuesday 5^th — 2.30pm Thursday 7^th September
Workshop + Conference ticket with accomodation: £250
- Check in to accommodation between 6—10pm Monday 4^nd September
- 9am Tuesday 5^th — 2.30pm Thursday 7^th September
Workshop + Conference ticket without accomodation: £210
- 9am Tuesday 5^th — 2.30pm Thursday 7^th September

Registration will open in mid-April 2023.

Abstracts for talks and posters will be solicited 1^st—11^th August 2023. Decisions will be made in a transparent manner, without reference to topic or institution. IDDconf 2023 offers a presentation mentoring scheme.

We are committed to making IDDconf a relaxed and safe experience for everyone, free from bullying or harassment of any nature. We expect all participants to act in a professional and responsible manner. If you experience or witness anything of concern, please contact one of the meeting organisers.

*There are cafes and supermarkets in Ambleside, or a supermarket at Windermere train station, that we recommend delegates visit to get breakfast. The accommodation has kitchen facilities including kettle, toaster, crockery and fridges.

IDDconf 2023: A Conference of Infectious Disease Dynamics

Tuesday 5th

Time	Presenter	Title	Chair
12:30-13:20		Lunch and Registration
13:20-13:30		Opening Remarks	Roz Eggo
13:30	Edwin van Leeuwen	The interplay between pre-season population susceptibility and the effectiveness of the rolled out vaccination control the timing and size of an emerging seasonal influenza wave in England	Roz Eggo
13:45	Kirsty Bolton	Seasonality as a driver of pH1N12009 influenza vaccination campaign impact
14:00	Maria Tang	Leading indicators for short-term forecasting of influenza hospital admissions in England
14:15	Joshua Blake	Estimating SARS-CoV-2 transmission from a representative prevalence survey: progress and challenges
14:30	Jonathon Mellor	Forecasting RSV hospital pressures in England using age, spatial and temporal structures.
14:45	Rebecca Mancy	The diffusion of public health progress and small-area mortality differentials in London and Glasgow during the epidemiological transition.
15:00-15:30		Coffee
15:30	Lorenzo Rimella	Simulation based composite likelihood	TJ McKinley
15:45	Andrew Iskauskas	Calibration of Complex Stochastic Models using Emulation and History Matching
16:00	Chris Jewell	Discrete-space data augmentation for stochastic metapopulation models: Covid19 in the UK
16:15	William Waites	Counting to ten: two-scale models by pattern matching
16:30	Lorenzo Pellis	Methods for the analysis of household-stratified infection data
16:45-17:00		Comfort Break
17:00	Andrew Conlan	Invasion dynamics of SARS-CoV2 in white tailed deer and prospects for long term persistence	Richard White
17:15	Brandon Hayes	Elucidating African swine fever transmission cycle dynamics at the domestic-wildlife interface: Multi-host epidemic modeling in Romania
17:30	Eve Emes	Challenging deep-rooted preconceptions about AMR and livestock: emerging results from the SEFASI consortium
17:45	Katie Tiley	Using models to inform target product profiles and preferred product characteristics: the example of Wolbachia replacement
18:00-19:30		Reception and Poster Session

Wednesday 6th

Time	Presenter	Title	Chair
9:00	Joseph Lemaitre	Influpaint: Generative artificial intelligence to forecast infectious disease epidemics	Katie Hampson
9:15	Samuel A Sutherland	Cost-effectiveness analysis of targeted end-game interventions against sleeping sickness across the Democratic Republic of Congo
9:30	Alex Kaye	The impact of climate change and variability on the global distribution of Aedes aegypti and the spread of dengue
9:45	Ching-I Huang	Who drives transmission of sleeping sickness?
10:00	Joe Hilton	Predicting avian flu outbreaks in Europe: what can ecological methods do for infectious disease modellers?
10:15-11:00		Coffee
11:00	Julia Gog	JUNIPER Consortium	Julia Gog
11:15	Kate Bubar	Fundamental limits to the effectiveness of traveler screening with molecular tests
11:30	Billy Quilty	Understanding Heterogeneity in SARS-CoV-2 Transmission: Exploring The Contribution of Viral Load and Social Contacts, and Their Significance for Testing-Based Control Approaches
11:45	Emilie Finch	Modelling the impact of population mobility, post-infection immunity and vaccination on SARS-CoV-2 transmission in the Dominican Republic
12:00	Francesca Scarabel	A time-since-infection model of contact tracing
12:15	Jess Bridgen	Identifying the role of hospital structure and staff interactions in nosocomial transmission of SARS-CoV-2
12:30	Naomi Waterlow	How demographic factors matter for antimicrobial resistance
12:45	Kath O'Reilly	The Clue is in the Poo... (utilising wastewater data for infectious diseases)
13:00-13:45		Lunch
13:50		Assemble for walk
14:00-17:30		Optional Walk / Free time

Thursday 7th

Time	Presenter	Title	Chair
9:00	Pablo Ruiz Cuenca	Disentangling fine-scale human movement through urban landscapes and its associations with infection risk	Kat Rock
9:15	Jonathan Read	Insights into mixing behaviour from large-scale contact tracing data
9:30	Michael Smah	Modelling infection spread via location, work group and household mixing
9:45	Maria A. Gutierrez	Population heterogeneity in within-host evolution: consequences for vaccine escape.
10:00	Julian Villabona-Arenas	Reconciling variation in HIV-1 acquisition probability with multiple founder variant probability
10:15	Tim Russell	Modelling individual-level viral kinetics and antibody dynamics for SARS-CoV-2, stratified by key covariates
10:30-11.00		Coffee
11:00	Elaine Ferguson	How does human behaviour impact dog rabies outbreaks?	Daniela de Angelis
11:15	Emily Nixon	Projecting the impact of a vaccine on incidence of Lassa Fever
11:30	Francesco Pinotti	Transmission dynamics of H9N2 Avian Influenza virus in a Live-Bird market in Chattogram, Bangladesh
11:45	Gemma Chaters	Estimating the Global Burden of Animal Diseases (GBADs)
12:00	Simon Spencer	Estimating HIV, HCV and HSV2 incidence from emergency department serosurvey
12:15-13:00		Lunch
13:00	Alexis Robert	Modelling the impact of MMR vaccine timeliness on the risk of measles outbreaks in England	Lorenzo Pellis
13:15	Alyssa Sbarra	Estimating subnational measles incidence and susceptibility to inform vaccination targeting strategies
13:30	Nieves Derqui	Evolution of un- and under-vaccinated children and delay in vaccination
13:45	Maddalena Donà	Possible counter-intuitive impact of local vaccine mandates for vaccine-preventable infectious diseases
14:00	Edward Hill	Developing a Public Involvement Framework in Mathematical and Health Economic Modelling for Vaccination Policy Recommendations
14:15		Closing Remarks
14:30		Close

Presentation Mentoring

As in previous years, IDDconf 2023 features a presentation mentoring scheme. The aim is to allow speakers and attendees get the most out of presentations at IDDconf 2023, by generating constructive feedback ahead of the meeting.

Mentors will be able to volunteer at registration. For mentees, at the time of title submission (1^st-11^th August) you will be able to opt in to join the scheme. We hope that mentors and mentees of all academic levels will opt in to the scheme.

The scheme will pair people from different institutions, who will then set up a 30-minute video call in the 10 days before IDDconf 2023. The mentee will give their presentation, and receive constructive feedback from the mentor.

Here are some resources to help in preparing talks:

“How to give a good scientific talk” (video by Julian Rayner)

This is a great place to start, and fits well with IDDconf format.
“How To Give a Good Talk” (Paper by Uri Alon)

Some more details here, splitting into considering preparation, delivery and handling questions afterwards.
“Ten simple rules for short and swift presentations” (paper by Christopher Lortie)

(Can skip the preamble.) The “rules” will help in preparing slides.

Family

IDDconf 2023 will provide bursaries for childcare during the conference. For those bringing a partner or other carer to look after a child, IDDconf will provide up to £70 towards travel costs. For those bringing children and booking childcare, IDDconf will also aim to contribute towards childcare costs (up to £200).

Delegates cannot claim both bursaries. We encourage delegates to claim from a grant or funding agency if that is possible, to demonstrate to funders the need for these subsidies.

IDDconf has a limited budget, and childcare subsidies will be allocated on a first-come first-served basis until that limit is reached.

Previous attendees have used accredited babysitting services in Ambleside, for which we can provide details, but IDDconf and LSHTM accept no responsibility for those companies.

Children and babies are welcome at IDDconf, but caregivers should please make regular efforts not to interrupt speakers during sessions. Children are the responsibility of parents/caregivers while on campus and at IDDconf. Parents should note that that there will be alcoholic beverages at the poster session.

Children and babies are unfortunately not allowed in the University of Cumbria accommodation, and therefore outside accommodation must be sought for those bringing children. We suggest doing so as soon as your plans are made, as there is high demand in Ambleside. You are welcome to use the IDDconf parent mailing list to co-ordinate with other parents to find accommodation. At registration, please let us know if you would like to be added to the mailing list for people who may make childcare arrangements in Ambleside.

Workshops

IDDconf 2023 will offer 2 parallel training sessions, from 9am—12.30pm on Tuesday 5^th September. Delegates can arrive on Monday evening, and therefore the cost of the workshops includes 1 night accommodation plus the session.

The two parallel workshops are:

1. Introduction to the ‘hmer’ package

Workshop leader: Andrew Iskauskas with TJ McKinley and Nicky McCreesh
Content outline: Hmer is an R-package that allows infectious disease modellers to easily and efficiently implement history matching with emulation. This is a relatively new calibration technique that was specifically designed to work with complex models. In this session we will introduce the main concepts of history matching with emulation and we will demonstrate the use of hmer package for the calibration of an SEIRS model.

2. Improving the reliability, usability and sustainability of code for epidemic analysis with R packages

Workshop leader: Andree Valle-Campos
Content outline: How can we improve the code we develop for our analysis? This session will cover best practices for developing and maintaining R packages for epidemic research, drawing on a range of examples from the Epiverse initiative. It will also discuss ways to manage collaborative package development projects, and tips and tricks for common tools such as Git and GitHub.

About

Our aim is to provide a fairly small (~100), community-driven conference, to improve interaction between modellers. We want a forum for modellers to present up to date work, stimulate discussion, and build collaborations. We are completely transparent about decision-making, and as many of these decisions as possible (such as talk selection) are done randomly. Last year we gave away leftover wine using a live random number selection in R!

IDDconf is organised by the Centre for Mathematical Modelling of Infectious Diseases at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine. Organisation is led by Roz Eggo, with Julia Gog (Cambridge), Alexis Robert, Graham Medley, and Jon Read (Lancaster) on the organisation team. The conference is run by LSHTM but there is no particular focus on LSHTM at the conference. CMMID provides sponsorship, and LSHTM event management capacity, both needed to make the conference happen!

IDDconf.org is the sister of IDDjobs.org, a community-driven site for finding and posting positions in infectious disease dynamics. Please add your jobs, and studentships there!

For any questions or queries regarding content, please email contact@iddconf.org, and in relation to logistics, organisation, or dietary requirements, events@lshtm.ac.uk (with IDDconf in the subject line).