The Role of Mathematical Models in Explaining Recurrent Outbreaks of Infectious Childhood Diseases

Infectious childhood diseases such as measles are characterized by recurrent outbreaks. Mathematicians have long used models in an effort to better understand and predict these recurrent outbreak patterns. This paper summarizes and comments upon those efforts, providing a historical outline of childhood disease models that have been developed since the start of the twentieth century. This paper also discusses the influence of data analysis techniques, such as spectral analysis, on the understanding and modelling of childhood disease dynamics.