A conceptual model for the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in Wuhan, China with individual reaction and governmental action

• Published in: International journal of infectious diseases Vol. 93; pp. 211 - 216
• Main Authors: Lin, Qianying, Zhao, Shi, Gao, Daozhou, Lou, Yijun, Yang, Shu, Musa, Salihu S., Wang, Maggie H., Cai, Yongli, Wang, Weiming, Yang, Lin, He, Daihai
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Canada Elsevier Ltd 01.04.2020; The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd on behalf of International Society for Infectious Diseases; Elsevier
• Subjects: Betacoronavirus; China - epidemiology; City lockdown; Coronavirus Infections - epidemiology; COVID-19; Disease Outbreaks; Epidemic; Government; Government Regulation; Governmental action; Humans; Individual reaction; Influenza Pandemic, 1918-1919 - statistics & numerical data; Mathematical modelling; Models, Biological; Pandemics; Pneumonia, Viral - epidemiology; Public Health - legislation & jurisprudence; Quarantine; SARS-CoV-2; Travel - legislation & jurisprudence; United Kingdom - epidemiology; United Kingdom; China; COVID-19; Epidemic; City lockdown; Individual reaction; Mathematical modelling; Governmental action
• ISSN: 1201-9712; 1878-3511; 1878-3511
• DOI: 10.1016/j.ijid.2020.02.058

•For the ongoing novel coronavirus disease (CODID-19) outbreak in Wuhan, China, the Chinese government has implemented control measures such as city lockdown to mitigate the impact of the epidemic.•We model the outbreak in Wuhan with individual reaction and governmental action (holiday extension, city lockdown, hospitalisation and quarantine) based on some parameters of the 1918 influenza pandemic in London, United Kingdom.•We show the different effects of individual reaction and governmental action and preliminarily estimate the magnitude of these effects.•We also preliminarily estimate the time-varying reporting ratio. The ongoing coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak, emerged in Wuhan, China in the end of 2019, has claimed more than 2600 lives as of 24 February 2020 and posed a huge threat to global public health. The Chinese government has implemented control measures including setting up special hospitals and travel restriction to mitigate the spread. We propose conceptual models for the COVID-19 outbreak in Wuhan with the consideration of individual behavioural reaction and governmental actions, e.g., holiday extension, travel restriction, hospitalisation and quarantine. We employe the estimates of these two key components from the 1918 influenza pandemic in London, United Kingdom, incorporated zoonotic introductions and the emigration, and then compute future trends and the reporting ratio. The model is concise in structure, and it successfully captures the course of the COVID-19 outbreak, and thus sheds light on understanding the trends of the outbreak.