title: WKB theory of epidemic fade-out in stochastic populations.
abstract: Stochastic effects may cause "fade-out" of an infectious disease in a population immediately after an epidemic outbreak. We evaluate the epidemic fade-out probability by a WKB method and find that the most probable path to extinction of the disease comes from an instantonlike orbit in the phase space of an underlying Hamiltonian flow.
authors.affiliation: Racah Institute of Physics, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem 91904, Israel.
authors.forename: Baruch
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Meerson
authors.forename: Pavel V
authors.initials: PV
authors.lastname: Sasorov