Vaccinating to protect a vulnerable subpopulation.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Epidemic influenza causes serious mortality and morbidity in temperate countries each winter. Research suggests that schoolchildren are critical in the spread of influenza virus, while the elderly and the very young are most vulnerable to the disease. Under these conditions, it is unclear how best to focus prevention efforts in order to protect the population. Here we investigate the question of how to protect a population against a disease when one group is particularly effective at spreading disease and another group is more vulnerable to the effects of the disease.

Methods and findings

We developed a simple mathematical model of an epidemic that includes assortative mixing between groups of hosts. We evaluate the impact of different vaccine allocation strategie

SUBMITTER: Dushoff J 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC1872043 | biostudies-literature | 2007 May

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature