Pandemic influenza in Papua New Guinea: a modelling study comparison with pandemic spread in a developed country

Milne, George J; Baskaran, Pravin; Halder, Nilimesh; Karl, Stephan; Kelso, Joel

The importance of suitable pandemic influenza preparedness plans for low-income countries is recognized by the WHO [4, 36] . Disease transmission models will play a role in guiding policy makers in determining the effectiveness of possible pandemic countermeasures. History tells us that low-income countries are likely to be more affected, yet almost all models deal with mitigation strategies for developed nations with good health infrastructure and low prevalence of endemic diseases. These countries have poorer access to antiviral drug and vaccine-based interventions and higher extant disease burdens, compared to developed countries. For the reasons, development of appropriate intervention strategies focused on countries such as PNG needs to occur. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 The baseline assumption in the main results is that individuals in neighbourhood hubs mix with 10 other individuals. If this value is alternatively assumed to be 20 or 30 individuals, additional contacts gives increased transmission and results in higher final attack rates. Compliance with home isolation of school children following school closure intervention has been examined and compliance reduction from 100% to 50% considered. Effects of the compliances on the illness attack rates have been presented in Table A4 . For the purely school closure intervention, illness attack rate increases by ~3% in Albany as reduced isolation permits additional childto-child contact. In the Madang models, reduced compliance with home isolation during the period of school closure has minimal effect on the attack rate as ~50% school age children do not attend school. In all three models, reduced compliance has minimal effect if rigorous social distancing intervention is applied.