Massive migration promotes the early spread of COVID-19 in China: a study based on a scale-free network

Abstract

Background: The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemic met coincidentally with massive migration before Lunar New Year in China in early 2020. This study is to investigate the relationship between the massive migration and the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) epidemic in China. Methods: The epidemic data between January 25th and February 15th and migration data between Jan 1st and Jan 24th were collected from the official websites. Using the R package WGCNA, we established a scale-free network of the selected cities. Correlation analysis was applied to describe the correlation between the Spring Migration and COVID-19 epidemic. Results: The epidemic seriousness in Hubei (except the city of Wuhan) was closely correlated with the migration from Wuhan between January 10 and January 24, 2020. The epidemic seriousness in the other provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions was largely affected by the immigration from Wuhan. By establishing a scale-free network of the regions, we divided the regions into two modules. The regions in the brown module consisted of three municipalities, nine provincial capitals and other 12 cities. The COVID-19 epidemics in these regions were more likely to be aggravated by migration. Conclusions: The migration from Wuhan could partly explain the epidemic seriousness in Hubei Province and other regions. The scale-free network we have established can better evaluate the epidemic. Three municipalities (Beijing, Shanghai and Tianjin), eight provincial capitals (including Nanjing, Changsha et al.) and 12 other cities (including Qingdao, Zhongshan, Shenzhen et al.) were hub cities in the spread of COVID-19 in China.

Text-based Analysis of the Geographic Spread of the COVID-19 Pandemic in China

“…Studies have shown that analyzing population out ow distribution based on mobile phone data in Wuhan can accurately identify and predict high-risk areas at an early stage [30]. The pandemic severity in other regions was primarily affected by emigration from Wuhan [31]. The analysis of the movement trajectory of con rmed cases presented in this study also demonstrated that the ow of con rmed cases originated from Wuhan, and the degree centrality showed the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic has evident spatial agglomeration.…”

Benign clinical and epidemiological outcomes-associated factors of COVID-19 from a solved epidemic with a low case fatality rate

“…Since massive migration is considered to promote the early spread of COVID-19 in China and China's practices with isolation of patients and quarantine of persons with close contacts [31,32], the early admissions of all patients and widespread antiviral therapy might be contributable for the benign epidemiological outcome of this local epidemic episode. Early admissions and early/widespread antiviral therapy might be helpful for the prevention of community and health worker infections.…”

Protection Strategy for Edge-Weighted Graphs in Disease Spread

“…The scale-free networks are networks whose distribution degree follows a power law distribution with an exponent between 2 and 3. The study of epidemics and disease dynamics on scale-free networks is a relevant theoretical issue [47], because this networks are a model for the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (see for instance [48]) or a model to explain the early spread of COVID-19 in China (see [49]). Many works that address this type of network in spread of disease can be found in the literature.…”