Threshold dynamics of a stochastic SIHR epidemic model of COVID-19 with general population-size dependent contact rate

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a stochastic SIHR epidemic model of COVID-19. A basic reproduction number $ R_{0}^{s} $ is defined to determine the extinction or persistence of the disease. If $ R_{0}^{s} < 1 $, the disease will be extinct. If $ R_{0}^{s} > 1 $, the disease will be strongly stochastically permanent. Based on realistic parameters of COVID-19, we numerically analyze the effect of key parameters such as transmission rate, confirmation rate and noise intensity on the dynamics of disease transmission and obtain sensitivity indices of some parameters on $ R_{0}^{s} $ by sensitivity analysis. It is found that: 1) The threshold level of deterministic model is overestimated in case of neglecting the effect of environmental noise; 2) The decrease of transmission rate and the increase of confirmed rate are beneficial to control the spread of COVID-19. Moreover, our sensitivity analysis indicates that the parameters $ \beta $, $ \sigma $ and $ \delta $ have significantly effects on $ R_0^s $.

Keywords: COVID-19; extinction; stochastic SIHR epidemic model; stochastically permanent; the basic reproduction number.