Voluntary vaccination strategy and the spread of sexually transmitted diseases

•We investigate the spread of STD with game-theoretic vaccination strategy involved.•Smoothed best response correspondence function is integrated into the model.•We reveal the relationship between voluntary vaccination uptake and the STD spread.•Perceived cost and payoff from social obligation are considered.•Degree of rationality and awareness of the consequences of STD are studied.

In this work, we investigate the spread and control of sexually transmitted diseases when a game-theory based vaccination strategy is involved. An individual’s decision on vaccination uptake may follow a cost-benefit analysis since the individual obtains immunity against the disease from the vaccination and, at the same time, may have some perceived side effects. Evolutionary game theory is integrated into the epidemic model to reveal the relationship between individuals’ voluntary decisions on vaccination uptake and the spread and control of such diseases. We show that decreasing the perceived cost of taking vaccine or increasing the payoff from social obligation is beneficial to controlling the disease. It is also shown how the “degree of rationality” of males and females affects the disease spread through the net payoff of the game. In particular, individual awareness of the consequences of the disease on the infectives also contributes to slowing down the disease spread. By analyzing an asymmetric version of our evolutionary game, it is shown that the disease is better controlled when individuals are more sensitive to fitness differences when net payoff is positive than when it is negative.