A measure of how easily a disease spreads
For contagious diseases, a reproductive number of 6 means that each sick person will pass the disease to an average of 6 people.
A measure of how long it takes an infected person to transmit a disease to the next "round" of people
A serial interval of 9 days means that about 9 days pass from when a person becomes contagious to when the next round of people become contagious.
The serial interval of Ebola is about 9-15 days.
A health organization confirms 200 new cases of Ebola. If no immunization is available, the virus will spread exponentially at first. Write a report for the health organization that details the spread of the virus if an immunization is not made available. Include equations for the possible numbers of confirmed cases and fatalities over time, as well as steps that can be taken to reduce the reproductive number.
