Identification of the relative timing of infectiousness and symptom onset for outbreak control.

J Theor Biol

The University of Adelaide, Stochastic Modelling & Operations Research Group, School of Mathematical Sciences, Adelaide, SA 5005, Australia. Electronic address:

Published: February 2020


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Article Abstract

In an outbreak of an emerging disease the epidemiological characteristics of the pathogen may be largely unknown. A key determinant of ability to control the outbreak is the relative timing of infectiousness and symptom onset. We provide a method for identifying this relationship with high accuracy based on data from simulated household-stratified symptom-onset data. Further, this can be achieved with observations taken on only a few specific days, chosen optimally, within each household. The information provided by this method may inform decision making processes for outbreak response. An accurate and computationally-efficient heuristic for determining the optimal surveillance scheme is introduced. This heuristic provides a novel approach to optimal design for Bayesian model discrimination.

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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7094159PMC
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jtbi.2019.110079DOI Listing

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