A mathematical model to assess the impact of testing and isolation compliance on the transmission of COVID-19

The COVID-19 pandemic has ravaged global health and national economies worldwide. Testing and isolation are effective control strategies to mitigate the transmission of COVID-19, especially in the early stage of the disease outbreak. In this paper, we develop a deterministic model to investigate the impact of testing and compliance with isolation on the transmission of COVID-19. We derive the control reproduction number 1ZC, which gives the threshold for disease elimination or prevalence. Using data from New York State in the early stage of the disease outbreak, we estimate 1ZC 1/4 7:989. Both elasticity and sensitivity analyses show that testing and compliance with isolation are significant in reducing 1ZC and disease prevalence. Simulation reveals that only high testing volume combined with a large proportion of individuals complying with isolation have great impact on mitigating the transmission. The testing starting date is also crucial: the earlier testing is imple-mented, the more impact it has on reducing the infection. The results obtained here would also be helpful in developing guidelines of early control strategies for pandemics similar to COVID-19.(c) 2023 The Authors. Publishing services by Elsevier B.V. on behalf of KeAi Communications Co. Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY-NC-ND license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/).