The deterministic and stochastic models developed by Bartlett (1956) to describe the initial spatial spread of an epidemic such as measles are extended to host-vector and carrier-borne epidemics such as malaria and typhoid in which more than one type of individual is involved. If the epidemic does not die out, then the behaviour predicted by the deterministic model and an examination of the mean distributions in the stochastic model is a wave of infection spreading out from the initial source of infection.

A simple model for a bivariate birth-death process is proposed. This model approximates to the host-vector epidemic situation. An investigation of the transient process is made and the mean behaviour over time is explicitly found. The probability of extinction and the behaviour of the process conditional upon extinction are examined and the probability distribution of the cumulative population size to extinction is found. Appropriate circumstances are suggested under which the model might possibly be applied to malaria. The host-vector model is classified within a general class of models which represent large population approximations to epidemics involving two types of infectives.