Analysis of a tuberculosis model with undetected and lost-sight cases

International audienceA deterministic model of tuberculosis (TB) in sub-Saharan Africa including undetected and lost-sight cases is presented and analyzed. The model is shown to exhibit the phenomenon of backward bifurca-tion, when a stable disease-free equilibrium co-exists with one or more stable endemic equilibrium points when the associated basic reproduction number (R 0) is less than unity. Analyzing the model obviously reveals that exogenous reinfection plays a key role on the existence of backward bifurcation. However, an analysis of the ranges of exogenous reinfection suggested that backward bifurcation occurs only for very high and unrealistic ranges of the exogeneous reinfection rate. Random perturbation of reinfection rates was performed to gain insight into the role of this latter on the stability of the disease free equilibrium