While cholera has hardly changed over the past centuries,the tools used to study it acquire not ceased to evolve. Using mobile phone records of 150000 users, an EPFL-led study has shown to what extent human mobility patterns contributed to the spread of a cholera epidemic in Senegal in 2005. The researchers' findings, or published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences,highlight the critical role a mass gathering of millions of pilgrims played in spreading of the disease, and how measures to improve sanitation at transmission hotspots could decrease the progression of future outbreaks.
Source: phys.org