Modeling strategies for controlling H1N1 outbreaks in China

There has been a global attack of A/H1N1 virus in 2009, which widely affected the world's normal stability and economic development. Since the emergence of the first diagnosed A/H1N1 influenza infected person in 11 May 2009 in China, very strict policy including quarantine and isolation measures were widely implemented to control the spread of this disease before the vaccine appeared. We propose a compartmental model that mimics the infection process of A/H1N1 under control strategies taken in mainland China. Apart from theoretical analysis, using the statistic data of Shaanxi Province, we estimated the unknown epidemiological parameters of this disease in Shaanxi via least-squares fitting method. The estimated control reproductive number of H1N1 for its first peak was ℛ _c1 = 2.555 (95% CI: 2.362-2.748) and that for the second peak was ℛ _c2 = 1.886 (95% CI: 1.765-2.001). Our findings in this paper suggest that neither quarantine nor isolation measures could be relaxed, and the implementation of these interventions can reduce the pandemic outbreak of A/H1N1 pandemic significantly.