An Ebola virus disease model with fear and environmental transmission dynamics

ABSTRACT Recent Ebola virus disease (EVD) outbreaks have been limited not only to the interactions between humans but also to the complex interplay of the environment, human and socio-economic factors. Changes in human behaviour as a result of fear can also affect disease transmission dynamics. In this paper, a compartmental model is used to study the dynamics of EVD incorporating fear and environmental transmission. We formulate a fear dependent contact rate function to measure the rate of person to person, as well as pathogen to person transmissions. The epidemic threshold and the model equilibria are determined and, their stabilities are analysed. The model is validated by fitting it to data from the 2019 and 2020 EVD outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Our results suggest that the fear of death from EVD may reduce the transmission and aid the control of the disease, but it is not sufficient to eradicate the disease. Policymakers need to also implement other control measures such as case finding, media campaigns, Quarantine and increase in the number of beds in the Ebola treatment centers, good laboratory services, safe burials and social mobilisation, to eradicate the disease. Highlights Due to its high case fatality rate, EVD undoubtedly instills fear in the inhabitants of any affected community. We propose an Ebola model with fear, which considers the pathogens in the environment to quantify the effect of fear and environmental transmission on the EVD disease dynamics. The fear of death from Ebola is proportional to the Ebola disease transmission rate. At high levels of fear, the number of EVD cases decrease.