Question

In discussions of the spread of the coronavirus there is often mention of flattening the curve. Which of the concepts discussed in this course would most accurately describe the point at which the curve begins to flatten? Provide justification for your answer.

Answer 1

Flattening of the curve can be associated with the "inflection point". The inflection point is the point where the rate of increase starts to slow down. For a function f(x), the inflection point could be found out by setting the second derivative f"(x) to zero. The virus infection curve could be most accurately defined by using a "logistic curve", for a logistic curve, the first half of the curve would represent an exponential model. After reaching a certain point ( the inflection point ), the rate of growth will start to slow down after infecting a considerable portion of the population.

Refer to the figure below to see the logistic curve with the inflection point.