Modelling the aqueous transport of an infectious pathogen in regional communities: application to the cholera outbreak in Haiti

Abstract

A mathematical model is developed to describe the dynamics of the spread of a waterborne disease among communities located along a flowing waterway. The model is formulated as a system of reaction–diffusion–advection partial differential equations in this spatial setting. The compartments of the model consist of susceptible, infected, and recovered individuals in the communities along the waterway, together with a term representing the pathogen load in each community and a term representing the spatial concentration of pathogens flowing along the waterway. The model is applied to the cholera outbreak in Haiti in 2010.