Simple SEIR model for simulating Covid-19 outbreak

[Bernd_Blasius]

Implementation of a SEIR-like model describing the Coronavirus Covid-19 outbreak 2019/20, based on the publication: Wang et al. (2020) Evolving epidemiology and impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions on the outbreak of coronavirus disease 2019 in Wuhan, China. MedRxive.

This code is not meant to be a qualitative tool for predicting the current outbreak dynamics in different parts of the world, but rather as a simple starting ground for running and exploring outbreak simulations.

The code can be found on my GitHub page

[timueh]

I did something similar, but overloaded the SEIR model with uncertainties, and propagated them using polynomial chaos expansion, see code on GitHub.

The basic SEIR equations are

which are augmented by another two equations to model patients that require intensive care units (ICU)

Assuming uncertainty for the basic reproduction rate R_0 and the fraction of patients that end up on ICUs, we get the following prototypicl behavior (Germany-related)

As you said, this definitely not to be taken as ground truth. I simply studied the system and wanted to play with it. If there is one lesson learned, then it’s this: stay home, and stay safe everyone!