Understanding the COVID-19 outbreak by modeling it. A simple Excel spreadsheet model illustrates the origins of the basic reproduction number R0 and herd immunity using the SIR epidemiological model. (Part 3 of 6)
The video uses a finite difference method to investigate the SIR model, first developed by Kermack and McKendrick way back in [1927]. In that model, susceptible individuals can become infected by another infected individual and then recover – that’s it! We’ll spend the rest of this Chapter 12 investigating the predictions of the SIR model. Even though it sounds straight forward, its mathematical predictions are surprisingly complex. The SIR model is the origin of the epidemiological parameter R0 (pronounced “R naught”) that you may read about in the news or heard about in the 2011 movie Contagion. It also predicts the concept of “herd immunity” that explains why not all susceptible people need be infected if social distancing is implemented and maintained.
Based on Chapter 12 of the upcoming Cambridge University Press book:
Biophysics and Physiological Modeling
by Peter Hugo Nelson
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