Mathematical COVID-19 model with vaccination: a case study in Saudi Arabia.

ABSTRACT

The discovery of a new form of corona-viruses in December 2019, SARS-CoV-2, commonly named COVID-19, has reshaped the world. With health and economic issues at stake, scientists have been focusing on understanding the dynamics of the disease, in order to provide the governments with the best policies and strategies allowing them to reduce the span of the virus. The world has been waiting for the vaccine for more than one year. The World Health Organization (WHO) is advertising the vaccine as a safe and effective measure to fight off the virus. Saudi Arabia was the fourth country in the world to start to vaccinate its population. Even with the new simplified COVID-19 rules, the third dose is still mandatory. COVID-19 vaccines have raised many questions regarding in its efficiency and its role to reduce the number of infections. In this work, we try to answer these question and propose a new mathematical model with five compartments, including susceptible, vaccinated, infectious, asymptotic and recovered individuals. We provide theoretical results regarding the effective reproduction number, the stability of endemic equilibrium and disease free equilibrium. We provide numerical analysis of the model based on the Saudi case. Our developed model shows that the vaccine reduces the transmission rate and provides an explanation to the rise in the number of new infections immediately after the start of the vaccination campaign in Saudi Arabia.