The impact of partner selection in the transmission dynamics of sexually transmitted viral infections

We constructed a compartmental mathematical model to study the dynamics of viral sexually transmitted infections (STIs) in a population consisting of men and women who engage in sexual contact with both sexes. Each sex is further split into compartments of susceptible, infected/infectious, and recovered/immune individuals, with constant per capita recovery and loss of immunity rates, while the per capita infection rates for each sex (force of infection) are based on standard incidence terms corresponding to the probabilities that the sexual partner of each sex that a susceptible individual randomly selects is an infected one. We explored possible effects of behavioral interventions, such as condom usage and reducing the number of sexual partnerships as well as the different dynamics of STI transmission between populations engaging solely in opposite-sex interactions and those engaging in non-opposite-sex interactions. These findings can help inform the development of public health policies aimed at alleviating the burden of sexually transmitted diseases.