EpiControl: a data-driven tool for optimising epidemic interventions and automating scenario planning to support real-time response

Deciding among outbreak control policies is challenging because available data are imperfect and intervention effects are uncertain. Complex disease models can simulate the economic and health consequences of interventions, but substantial data or computational demands coupled with the specialist knowledge needed for calibration limit their real-time application. Simpler, faster and more generalised tools exist but typically they only estimate or forecast transmission dynamics under preset assumptions. We present EpiControl, a flexible tool (in R) for public health modellers to support policymaking that fits semi-mechanistic models to routine data and leverages feedback-control and model-bas