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An epidemic model is a simplified means of describing the transmission of communicable disease through individuals. ==Introduction== The modeling of infectious diseases is a tool which has been used to study the mechanisms by which diseases spread, to predict the future course of an outbreak and to evaluate strategies to control an epidemic (Daley & Gani, 2005). The first scientist who systematically tried to quantify causes of death was John Graunt in his book ''Natural and Political Observations made upon the Bills of Mortality'', in 1662. The bills he studied were listings of numbers and causes of deaths published weekly. Graunt’s analysis of causes of death is considered the beginning of the “theory of competing risks” which according to Daley and Gani (Daley & Gani, 2005, p. 2) is “a theory that is now well established among modern epidemiologists”. The earliest account of mathematical modeling of spread of disease was carried out in 1766 by Daniel Bernoulli. Trained as a physician, Bernoulli created a mathematical model to defend the practice of inoculating against smallpox (Hethcote, 2000). The calculations from this model showed that universal inoculation against smallpox would increase the life expectancy from 26 years 7 months to 29 years 9 months (Bernoulli & Blower, 2004). Daniel Bernoulli's work preceded our modern understanding of germ theory, and it was not until the research of Ronald Ross into the spread of malaria, that modern theoretical epidemiology began. This was soon followed by the work of A. G. McKendrick and W. O. Kermack, whose paper ''A Contribution to the Mathematical Theory of Epidemics'' was published in 1927. A simple deterministic (compartmental) model was formulated in this paper. The model was successful in predicting the behavior of outbreaks very similar to that observed in many recorded epidemics (Brauer & Castillo-Chavez, 2001). 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「epidemic model」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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