Related papers: Taming the spread of an epidemics by lockdown poli…
This paper combines a canonical epidemiology model of disease dynamics with government policy of lockdown and testing, and agents' decision to social distance in order to avoid getting infected. The model is calibrated with data on deaths…
We formulate an optimal control problem to determine the lockdown policy to curb an epidemic where other control measures are not available yet. We present a unified framework to model the epidemic and economy that allows us to study the…
Lockdown procedures have been proven successful in mitigating the spread of the viruses in this COVID-19 pandemic, but they also have devastating impact on the economy. We use a modified Susceptible-Infectious-Recovered-Deceased model with…
We consider a model for an epidemic in a population that occupies geographically distinct locations. The disease is spread within subpopulations by contacts between infective and susceptible individuals, and is spread between subpopulations…
We study equilibrium distancing during epidemics. Distancing reduces the individual's probability of getting infected but comes at a cost. It creates a single-peaked epidemic, flattens the curve and decreases the size of the epidemic. We…
Understanding how to effectively control an epidemic spreading on a network is a problem of paramount importance for the scientific community. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has highlighted the need for policies that mitigate the spread,…
This article considers the minimization of the total number of infected individuals over the course of an epidemic in which the rate of infectious contacts can be reduced by time-dependent nonpharmaceutical interventions. The societal and…
In this work, we provide a general mathematical formalism to study the optimal control of an epidemic, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, via incentives to lockdown and testing. In particular, we model the interplay between the government and…
The design of an efficient curing policy, able to stem an epidemic process at an affordable cost, has to account for the structure of the population contact network supporting the contagious process. Thus, we tackle the problem of…
Epidemics of infectious diseases posing a serious risk to human health have occurred throughout history. During recent epidemics there has been much debate about policy, including how and when to impose restrictions on behaviour.…
Several non-pharmaceutical interventions have been proposed to control the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. On the large scale, these empirical solutions, often associated with extended and complete lockdowns, attempt to minimize the costs…
The recent COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the need of non-pharmaceutical interventions in the first stages of a pandemic. Among these, lockdown policies proved unavoidable yet extremely costly from an economic perspective. To better…
We investigate the containment of epidemic spreading in networks from a normative point of view. We consider a susceptible/infected model in which agents can invest in order to reduce the contagiousness of network links. In this setting, we…
This paper is based on the observation that, during Covid-19 epidemic, the choice of which individuals should be tested has an important impact on the effectiveness of selective confinement measures. This decision problem is closely related…
One of the critical measures to control infectious diseases is a lockdown. Once past the lockdown stage in many parts of the world, the crucial question now concerns the effects of relaxing the lockdown and finding the best ways to…
Epidemic spreading can be suppressed by the introduction of containment measures such as social distancing and lock downs. Yet, when such measures are relaxed, new epidemic waves and infection cycles may occur. Here we explore this issue in…
We propose a tractable epidemic model that includes containment measures. In the absence of containment measures, the epidemics spread exponentially fast whenever the infectivity rate is positive, $\lambda>0$. The containment measures are…
In the context of the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, several reports and studies have attempted to model and predict the spread of the disease. There is also intense debate about policies for limiting the damage, both to health and to the…
During a pandemic, there are conflicting demands arising from public health and economic cost. Lockdowns are a common way of containing infections, but they adversely affect the economy. We study the question of how to minimise the economic…
The spread of COVID-19 has been thwarted in most countries through non-pharmaceutical interventions. In particular, the most effective measures in this direction have been the stay-at-home and closure strategies of businesses and schools.…