IEEE Computational Intelligence Magazine - November 2020 - 23

A Bayesian
Updating
Scheme for
Pandemics:
Estimating the
Infection Dynamics
of COVID-19
©SHUTTERSTOCK/MILA SUPINSKAYA GLASHCHENKO

Shuo Wang, Philip Nadler, and Rossella Arcucci
Imperial College London, UK

Xian Yang
Hong Kong Baptist University,
China and Imperial College London, UK

Ling Li
University of Kent, UK

Yuan Huang
University of Cambridge, UK

Zhongzhao Teng
University of Cambridge, UK

Yike Guo
Hong Kong Baptist University, China and Imperial College
London, UK

Abstract-Epidemic models play a key role in understanding
and responding to the emerging COVID-19 pandemic. Widely
used compartmental models are static and are of limited use to
evaluate intervention strategies of combatting the pandemic.
Applying the technology of data assimilation, we propose a
Bayesian updating approach for estimating epidemiological
parameters using observable information to assess the impacts

Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MCI.2020.3019874
Date of current version: 14 October 2020
© IEEE 2020. This article is free to access and
download, along with rights for full text
and data mining, re-use and analysis.

of different intervention strategies. We adopt a concise renewal
model and propose new parameters by disentangling the
reduction of instantaneous reproduction number R t into mitigation and suppression factors to quantify intervention impacts
at a finer granularity. A data assimilation framework is developed to estimate these parameters including constructing an
observation function and developing a Bayesian updating
scheme. A statistical analysis framework is built to quantify the
impacts of intervention strategies by monitoring the evolution
of the estimated parameters. We reveal the intervention impacts
in European countries and Wuhan and the resurgence risk in
the United States.

I

I. Introduction

n response to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments
have taken non-pharmaceutical intervention measures.
Common measures include travel restriction, school and
non-essential business closure and social distancing, as
well as early isolation of confirmed patients. Recently, as the
first-wave epidemic peak faded away in many countries, the
accumulated observations of epidemic growth [1] and corresponding intervention policies [2] shed more insights on how
the interventions worked. Meanwhile, many governments
have switched into the phase to reopen economic and social
activities with attention on tamping down possible resurgences. However, recent second-wave outbreaks in some countries

Corresponding author: Yike Guo (email: yikeguo@hkbu.edu.hk).
Shuo Wang and Xian Yang had equal contribution.

NOVEMBER 2020 | IEEE COMPUTATIONAL INTELLIGENCE MAGAZINE

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IEEE Computational Intelligence Magazine - November 2020

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