Mathematical modelling of the HIV/AIDS epidemic and the effect of public health education
HIV/AIDS is nowadays considered as the greatest public health disaster of modern time. Its progression has challenged the global population for decades. Through mathematical modelling, researchers have studied different interventions on the HIV pandemic, such as treatment, education, condom use, etc. Our research focuses on different compartmental models with emphasis on the effect of public health education. From the point of view of statistics, it is well known how the public health educational programs contribute towards the reduction of the spread of HIV/AIDS epidemic. Many models have been studied towards understanding the dynamics of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The impact of ARV treatment have been observed and analysed by many researchers. Our research studies and investigates a compartmental model of HIV with treatment and education campaign. We study the existence of equilibrium points and their stability. Original contributions of this dissertation are the modifications on the model of Cai et al. [1], which enables us to use optimal control theory to identify optimal roll-out of strategies to control the HIV/AIDS. Furthermore, we introduce randomness into the model and we study the almost sure exponential stability of the disease free equilibrium. The randomness is regarded as environmental perturbations in the system. Another contribution is the global stability analysis on the model of Nyabadza et al. in [3]. The stability thresholds are compared for the HIV/AIDS in the absence of any intervention to assess the possible community benefit of public health educational campaigns. We illustrate the results by way simulation The following papers form the basis of much of the content of this dissertation, [1 ] L. Cai, Xuezhi Li, Mini Ghosh, Boazhu Guo. Stability analysis of an HIV/AIDS epidemic model with treatment, 229 (2009) 313-323. [2 ] C.P. Bhunu, S. Mushayabasa, H. Kojouharov, J.M. Tchuenche. Mathematical Analysis of an HIV/AIDS Model: Impact of Educational Programs and Abstinence in Sub-Saharan Africa. J Math Model Algor 10 (2011),31-55. [3 ] F. Nyabadza, C. Chiyaka, Z. Mukandavire, S.D. Hove-Musekwa. Analysis of an HIV/AIDS model with public-health information campaigns and individual with-drawal. Journal of Biological Systems, 18, 2 (2010) 357-375. Through this dissertation the author has contributed to two manuscripts [4] and [5], which are currently under review towards publication in journals, [4 ] G. Abiodun, S. Maku Vyambwera, N. Marcus, K. Okosun, P. Witbooi. Control and sensitivity of an HIV model with public health education (under submission). [5 ] P.Witbooi, M. Nsuami, S. Maku Vyambwera. Stability of a stochastic model of HIV population dynamics (under submission).
Disease-free equilibrium, Endemic equilibrium, Basic reproduction number, Local and global stability, Sensitivity
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