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Mathematical models of contact patterns between age groups for predicting the spread of infectious diseases
- Source :
- Mathematical Biosciences and Engineering. 10:1475-1497
- Publication Year :
- 2013
- Publisher :
- American Institute of Mathematical Sciences (AIMS), 2013.
-
Abstract
- The spread of an infectious disease is sensitive to the contact patterns in the population and to precautions people take to reduce the transmission of the disease. We investigate the impact that different mixing assumptions have on the spread an infectious disease in an age-structured ordinary differential equation model. We consider the impact of heterogeneity in susceptibility and infectivity within the population on the disease transmission. We apply the analysis to the spread of a smallpox-like disease, derive the formula for the reproduction number, R0, and based on this threshold parameter, show the level of human behavioral change required to control the epidemic. We analyze how different mixing patterns can affect the disease prevalence, the cumulative number of new infections, and the final epidemic size. Our analysis indicates that the combination of residual immunity and behavioral changes during a smallpox-like disease outbreak can play a key role in halting infectious disease spread; and that realistic mixing patterns must be included in the epidemic model for the predictions to accurately reflect reality.
- Subjects :
- Adult
Time Factors
Adolescent
Population
Basic Reproduction Number
Force of infection
Biology
Communicable Diseases
Models, Biological
Article
Mathematical modelling of infectious disease
Disease Outbreaks
Young Adult
Statistics
Prevalence
Humans
Child
Epidemics
education
Aged
Aged, 80 and over
education.field_of_study
Applied Mathematics
Infant
Outbreak
General Medicine
Middle Aged
Computational Mathematics
Infectious disease (medical specialty)
Child, Preschool
Modeling and Simulation
Communicable disease transmission
Immunology
Disease Susceptibility
General Agricultural and Biological Sciences
Epidemic model
Basic reproduction number
Smallpox
Subjects
Details
- ISSN :
- 15510018
- Volume :
- 10
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- Mathematical Biosciences and Engineering
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....412c552dc20085ba175e8deb53968b41