Community lockdowns in social networks hardly mitigate epidemic spreading

Abstract

Community lockdowns and travel restrictions are commonly employed to decelerate epidemic spreading. We here use a stochastic susceptible-infectious-recovered model on different social networks to determine when and to what degree such lockdowns are likely to be effective. Our research shows that community lockdowns are effective only if the links outside of the communities are virtually completely sealed off. The benefits of targeting specifically these links, as opposed to links uniformly at random across the whole network, are inferable only beyond 90% lockdown effectiveness. And even then the peak of the infected curve decreases by only 20% and its onset is delayed by a factor of 1.5. This holds for static and temporal social networks, regardless of their size and structural particularities. Networks derived from cell phone location data and online location-based social platforms yield the same results as a large family of hyperbolic geometric network models where characteristic path lengths, clustering, and community structure can be arbitrarily adjusted. The complex connectedness of modern human societies, which enables the ease of global communication and the lightning speeds at which news and information spread, thus makes it very difficult to halt epidemic spreading with top-down measures. We therefore emphasize the outstanding importance of endogenous self-isolation and social distancing for successfully arresting epidemic spreading.

Socio-demographic and health factors drive the epidemic progression and should guide vaccination strategies for best COVID-19 containment

“…This network model produces interaction structures with genuine characteristics of social networks [58] , [59] , [60] . Networks embedded in hyperbolic spaces exhibit a small diameter, strong clustering, community structure, and a heterogeneous degree distribution and are therefore commonly used to simulate various social phenomena, including epidemics [61] , [62] , [63] . In our study, we utilized the geometric preferential attachment model, where each newly added node i is mapped into the hyperbolic disc with randomly assigned polar coordinates: …”

A Literature Review of Social Network Analysis in Epidemic Prevention and Control

“…Chen et al [23], Gong et al [25], and Min et al [69] used the SIR model to simulate the epidemic dynamics in the generated network. To study the effectiveness of community blockade in preventing the spread of epidemics, Gosak et al [95] simulated a random SIR model on different social networks. e SIR model helps to study immune strategies.…”

“…Taking into account the development of appropriate vaccination strategies on the dynamic contact network, Shahzamal et al [131] proposed a strategy based on local contact information, called the individual's movement-based vaccination strategy. Numerical simulations by Yang [17] and Parousis-Orthodox [95] showed that networks with a higher modularity index are more likely to be affected by the central vaccination technology between nodes, so immunization of central nodes is a good way to alleviate epidemics. Based on the concept of independent set, Huang [74] proposed a new immune strategy for complex networks, an immune method with the largest vertex of independent concentration, called independent set target immunity.…”

Extension of SEIR Compartmental Models for Constructive Lyapunov Control of COVID-19 and Analysis in Terms of Practical Stability

“…This model indicates that disregarding social distancing and hygiene concepts can cause devastating effects on the human population. On the other hand, as shown in [20], lockdowns limited to communities together with travel restrictions are commonly employed to reduce epidemic spreading, but not totally effective if the people are not completely sealed off. In this contribution, a stochastic model on different social networks is considered to determine the level of effectiveness of lockdowns and to identify which social network compartments should be considered.…”