title: A new approach for designing disease intervention strategies in metapopulation models.
abstract: We describe a new approach for investigating the control strategies of compartmental disease transmission models. The method rests on the construction of various alternative next-generation matrices, and makes use of the type reproduction number and the target reproduction number. A general metapopulation SIRS (susceptible-infected-recovered-susceptible) model is given to illustrate the application of the method. Such model is useful to study a wide variety of diseases where the population is distributed over geographically separated regions. Considering various control measures such as vaccination, social distancing, and travel restrictions, the procedure allows us to precisely describe in terms of the model parameters, how control methods should be implemented in the SIRS model to ensure disease elimination. In particular, we characterize cases where changing only the travel rates between the regions is sufficient to prevent an outbreak.
authors.affiliation: a Agent-Based Modelling Laboratory, 331 Lumbers , York University , 4700 Keele St., Toronto , ON , Canada M3J 1P3.|b MTA-SZTE Analysis and Stochastic Research Group , University of Szeged , Aradi vértanúk tere 1, H-6720 Szeged , Hungary.
authors.forename: Diana
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Knipl
mesh_terms: D003141:Communicable Diseases / Q000635:transmission*; D006801:Humans; D008962:Models, Theoretical
keywords: 92D30; Metapopulation epidemic models; alternative next-generation matrix; intervention strategies; target reproduction number; type reproduction number