We study the spread of epidemics (human and animal) over spatial networks. Within this analysis, we are interested in a few main questions:
A. Can we estimate the spread mechanism and its rates from the course of the disease?
B. Can we detect the network over which the disease spreads from the course of the disease?
C. Can the network and the spread mechanism be detected simultaneously?
We study these questions in network containing a mixture of a geographical local and long distance spread, and propose methods to separate the two types of spreads. These questions apply to real diseases, but also to the spread of ideas, computer viruses and products.