Feasibility of Controlling COVID-19 Outbreaks in the UK by Rolling Interventions

Po Yang; Jun Qi; Shuhao Zhang; Gaoshan Bi; Xulong Wang; Yun Yang; Bin Sheng; Xuxin Mao

Notably, the total infections estimated in our model was measured by Exposed population (asymptomatic), which might be largely greater than other works only estimating Infectious population (symptomatic). We found that a large portion of self-recovered population were asymptomatic or mild symptomatic in the COVID-19 breakouts in Wuhan (occupied about 42%-60% of the total infectious population). These people might think they had been healthy at home because they did not go to hospital for COVID-19 tests. It was one important issue that some SEIR model predicted infectious population in Wuhan that 10 times over than confirmed cases. 12 Our results show that taking rolling intervention is one optimal strategy to effectively and efficiently control COVID-19 outbreaks in the UK. This strategy potentially reduces the overall infections and deaths; delays and reduces peak healthcare demand. In future, our model will be extended to investigate how to optimise the timing and strength of intervention to reduce COVID-19 morality and specific healthcare demand.