How to avoid a local epidemic becoming a global pandemic

Abstract

Here, we combine international air travel passenger data with a standard epidemiological model of the initial 3 mo of the COVID-19 pandemic (January through March 2020; toward the end of which the entire world locked down). Using the information available during this initial phase of the pandemic, our model accurately describes the main features of the actual global development of the pandemic demonstrated by the high degree of coherence between the model and global data. The validated model allows for an exploration of alternative policy efficacies (reducing air travel and/or introducing different degrees of compulsory immigration quarantine upon arrival to a country) in delaying the global spread of SARS-CoV-2 and thus is suggestive of similar efficacy in anticipating the spread of future global disease outbreaks. We show that a lesson from the recent pandemic is that reducing air travel globally is more effective in reducing the global spread than adopting immigration quarantine. Reducing air travel out of a source country has the most important effect regarding the spreading of the disease to the rest of the world. Based upon our results, we propose a digital twin as a further developed tool to inform future pandemic decision-making to inform measures intended to control the spread of disease agents of potential future pandemics. We discuss the design criteria for such a digital twin model as well as the feasibility of obtaining access to the necessary online data on international air travel.

Supply chains create global benefits from improved vaccine accessibility

“…COVID-19 has resulted in varying degrees of social lockdown in countries all around the world 45 . The lockdown strictness by each country is measured by the percentage by which labor availability and transportation capacity are reduced relative to pre-pandemic levels.…”

Dynamics of viral disease outbreaks: A hundred years (1918/19–2019/20) in retrospect ‐ Loses, lessons and emerging issues

“…Consequently, pandemics are more likely to occur where there is increasing interaction among human populations, and among human and animal ecological communities. [67][68][69][70][71] Furthermore, trade expansion, ease of local mobility and international air travel, which promote more frequent human-human interactions, represent important contributory factors for spread, once viral emergence has occurred. 66,72 It is noteworthy that several of the outbreaks recorded, such as the SARS coronavirus, spread to several other nations as a result of travelling before the transmission was brought under control.…”

“…Contact with respiratory droplets from infected person, contact with blood or body fluids from infected person, contact with infected animal or animal product, and bite of infected arthropod such as mosquito, are some of the routes of transmission of the viral outbreaks observed. Consequently, pandemics are more likely to occur where there is increasing interaction among human populations, and among human and animal ecological communities 67–71 . Furthermore, trade expansion, ease of local mobility and international air travel, which promote more frequent human‐human interactions, represent important contributory factors for spread, once viral emergence has occurred 66,72 .…”

Digital twin for pandemic monitoring and prevention: Urgent need for agreements for global data sharing

“…By combining international air travel passenger data with standard epidemiological modeling, Stenseth et al ( 1 ) show that reduced flying between countries, with varying spread of an infectious agent may be a more efficient step toward infectious disease control than enforcing immigration quarantine. Although these results are based on data accumulated during the COVID-19 pandemic, they could be of fundamental importance also for other pathogens, by indicating how innovative approaches could help build better preparedness for new pandemics and—depending on the pattern of spread–even prevent local epidemics from developing into global ones.…”

“…The next time around tools should be in place to make nonpharmaceutical interventions more precise to prevent unwanted societal impacts. The work of Stenseth et al ( 1 ) is promising and suggests that “digital twins” ( 2 ) can be established to closely monitor the development of new epidemics and to inform decisions aimed at containing outbreaks.…”