A deterministic model to assess the impact of HAART in Sub-Saharan countries. An application to Botswana.

• Main Authors: Christian Viladent, Ann Van Ackere
• Other Authors: The Pennsylvania State University CiteSeerX Archives
• Format: Text
• Language: English
• Subjects: Avian flu
• Online Access: http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?doi=10.1.1.408.7478; http://www.systemdynamics.org/conferences/2006/proceed/papers/VILAD405.pdf

Recently news about the severe acute respiratory syndrome and avian flu viruses has caused significant panic in many countries. These viruses, for Europe still very much a theoretical danger obscure the much more immediate danger of the human immune deficiency virus/acquired immune deficiency syndrome, HIV/AIDS. We develop a deterministic compartmental simulation model to assess the impact of highly active antiretroviral therapy (HAART) and other interventions in sub-Saharan countries. We calibrate this model using data from Botswana. We also include a cost-effectiveness analysis. To our knowledge our model is the first deterministic model to include all the important factors of the HIV/AIDS transmission and a dynamic calculation of the life expectancy. The model shows that HAART alone, at the current implementation level, cannot significantly impact the number of HIV/AIDS infected individuals in the long term. The association of HAART with the treatment of other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) shows the maximal cost-effectiveness under the current model settings.