Modeling the COVID-19 Pandemic Using an SEIHR Model With Human Migration
Published in IEEE Access, 2020-10-20
Proposes an SEIHR compartmental model with migration for COVID-19 and applies it to epidemiological data from Hong Kong and elsewhere.
Abstract: The 2019 novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak has become a worldwide problem. Due to globalization and the proliferation of international travel, many countries are now facing local epidemics. The existence of asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic transmissions makes it more difficult to control disease transmission by isolating infectious individuals. To accurately describe and represent the spread of COVID-19, we suggest a susceptible-exposed-infected-hospitalized-removed (SEIHR) model with human migrations, where the “exposed” (asymptomatic) individuals are contagious. From this model, we derive the basic reproduction number of the disease and its relationship with the model parameters. We find that, for highly contagious diseases like COVID-19, when the adjacent region’s epidemic is not severe, a large migration rate can reduce the speed of local epidemic spreading at the price of infecting the neighboring regions. In addition, since “infected” (symptomatic) patients are isolated almost immediately, the transmission rate of the epidemic is more sensitive to that of the “exposed” (asymptomatic) individuals. Furthermore, we investigate the impact of various interventions, e.g. isolation and border control, on the speed of disease propagation and the resultant demand on medical facilities, and find that a strict intervention measure can be more effective than closing the borders. Finally, we use some real historical data of COVID-19 caseloads from different regions, including Hong Kong, to validate the modified SEIHR model, and make an accurate prediction for the third wave of the outbreak in Hong Kong.
DOI: 10.1109/ACCESS.2020.3032584
Recommended citation:
R. Niu, E. W. M. Wong, Y.-C. Chan, M. A. Van Wyk, and G. Chen, “Modeling the COVID-19 pandemic using an SEIHR model with human migration,” IEEE Access, vol. 8, pp. 195503–195514, 2020.