Influence of landscape patterns on the exposure of LASV across diverse regions within the Republic of Guinea

Lassa fever virus (LASV) is the causative agent of Lassa fever, a disease endemic in West Africa. Exploring the relationships between environmental factors and LASV transmission across ecologically diverse regions can provide crucial information for the design of appropriate interventions and disease monitoring. We measured LASV-specific IgG seropositivity in 1286 sera collected in Coastal and Forested Guinea. Our results showed that exposure to LASV was heterogenous between the sites. The LASV IgG seropositivity was 11.9% (95% CI 9.7-14.5) in Coastal site, while it was 59.6% (95% CI 55.5-63.5) in Forested region. Interestingly, exposure was significantly associated with age, with seropositivity increasing with age in the Coastal site. Finally, we also found significant associations between exposure risk to LASV and landscape fragmentation in Coastal and Forested regions. This study may help to define the regions with an increased exposure risk to LASV where a close surveillance of LASV circulation is needed. ### Competing Interest Statement The authors have declared no competing interest. ### Funding Statement This study was funded by the US Food & Drug Administration (HHSF223201510104C) and the CGIAR Research Program on Agriculture for Nutrition and Health (A4NH). SG was supported by grants GU883/5-1 and GU883/5-2 from the German Research Foundation (DFG). KMF is supported by a Sir Henry Dale Fellowship jointly funded by the Wellcome Trust and the Royal Society (Grant no. 221963/Z/20/Z). ### Author Declarations I confirm all relevant ethical guidelines have been followed, and any necessary IRB and/or ethics committee approvals have been obtained. Yes The details of the IRB/oversight body that provided approval or exemption for the research described are given below: The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine Ethics committee (Ethics Ref: 17429) gave ethical approval for this work. The Comite national d ethique pour la recherche en sante (CNERS) of Republic of Guinea gave ethical approval for this work on the 16th of March 2017 (012/CNERS/17). I confirm that all necessary patient/participant consent has been obtained and the appropriate institutional forms have been archived, and that any patient/participant/sample identifiers included were not known to anyone (e.g., hospital staff, patients or participants themselves) outside the research group so cannot be used to identify individuals. Yes I understand that all clinical trials and any other prospective interventional studies must be registered with an ICMJE-approved registry, such as ClinicalTrials.gov. I confirm that any such study reported in the manuscript has been registered and the trial registration ID is provided (note: if posting a prospective study registered retrospectively, please provide a statement in the trial ID field explaining why the study was not registered in advance). Yes I have followed all appropriate research reporting guidelines and uploaded the relevant EQUATOR Network research reporting checklist(s) and other pertinent material as supplementary files, if applicable. Yes All data produced in the present study are available upon reasonable request to the authors