Contact tracing is a key tool for managing epidemic diseases like HIV, tuberculosis, and COVID-19. Manual investigations by human contact tracers remain a dominant way in which this is carried out. This process is limited by the number of contact tracers available, who are often overburdened during an outbreak or epidemic. As a result, a crucial decision in any contact tracing strategy is, given a set of contacts, which person should a tracer trace next? In this work, we develop a formal model that articulates these questions and provides a framework for comparing contact tracing strategies. Through analyzing our model, we give provably optimal prioritization policies via a clean connection to a tool from operations research called a "branching bandit". Examining these policies gives qualitative insight into trade-offs in contact tracing applications.
翻译:接触追踪是管理艾滋病毒、肺结核和COVID-19等传染病的关键工具。 人类接触追踪器的人工调查仍然是开展这项工作的主要方式。 这一过程受到现有接触追踪器数量的限制,这些追踪器在爆发或流行病期间往往负担过重。 因此,在任何接触追踪战略中作出的关键决定是,如果有一系列接触,下一个谁应该追踪?在这项工作中,我们开发了一种正式模式,阐明这些问题,并为比较接触追踪战略提供了一个框架。通过分析我们的模型,我们通过将一个称为“支架强盗”的业务研究工具清洁地连接起来,提供了最优化的优先排序政策。审查这些政策可以从质量上了解接触追踪应用的取舍。