Simulation of COVID-19 Propagation Scenarios in the Madrid Metropolitan Area

Singh, David E.; Marinescu, Maria-Cristina; Guzmán-Merino, Miguel; Durán, Christian; Delgado‐Sanz, Concepción; Gómez‐Barroso, Diana; Carretero, Jesús

doi:10.3389/fpubh.2021.636023

Cited by 21 publications

(24 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…However, it is almost certain that greater adherence to non-pharmaceutical public health measures, such as wearing masks, would have prevented the explosion of new COVID-19 cases in the U.S. as it occurred between October 2020 and January 2021 (cf. Li et al, 2020b;Singh et al, 2021).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…If perceived utility is the critical ingredient to motivate mask wearing, then researchers must exercise great care when they are tempted to condemn the fact that individuals refuse to wear masks, even when scientific literature supports that masks will curb infection (e.g., Singh et al, 2021 ). The reluctance of conservatives to wear masks should not necessarily be interpreted as irrational, or as obstinate resistance to engaging in a salutary behavior.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Mask Wearing as Cultural Behavior: An Investigation Across 45 U.S. States During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Kemmelmeier

Jami

2021

Front. Psychol.

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Although masks (face coverings) are a prime tool in fighting airborne pathogens, during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States the use of masks encountered resistance based on existing patterns of cultural division. We argue that mask wearing must be understood basis on existing cultural frames assessed at both the individual level and the state level. We relied on prominent frameworks in cultural psychology: individualism-collectivism as well as independent and interdependent self-construals, the tightness-looseness framework, U.S. honor cultures, and political orientation as predictors. Using multilevel modeling, in a sample of 633 respondents from 45 U.S. states we investigated mask-wearing behavior, masks' perceived utility, implications for well-being, and the social meaning attributed to masks. Conservatism was linked to lower mask wearing, and consistently unfavorable perceptions of mask wearing. Collective interdependence predicted favorable perceptions of masks, as did state-level differences in collectivism; both constructs were linked with viewing mask wearing to be normative. Independent self-construal predicted a greater intent to wear masks, even though masks were also evaluated less favorably. Mediation analyses revealed that a single mediator, the perceived utility of mask wearing, was implicated in translating the effects of different cultural predictors into behavior. Additional findings highlighted that in tightener (vs. looser) states masks wearing was conceived of as a civic duty, whereas in U.S. honor states mask were seen as spoiling one's public image. Our discussion focuses on the cultural and political context of mask wearing, argues that different communities in the U.S. respond to its symbolic and social meaning, and suggest strategies to increase mask wearing among those who are otherwise reluctant to do so.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mask Wearing as Cultural Behavior: An Investigation Across 45 U.S. States During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Kemmelmeier

Jami

2021

Front. Psychol.

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“…2 is an extended version of the figure presented in Ref. [ 33 ]. It shows the different infection phases, which are described below: Incubation stage.…”

Section: Methodsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Assessing population-sampling strategies for reducing the COVID-19 incidence

Guzmán-Merino

Durán

Marinescu

et al. 2021

Computers in Biology and Medicine

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As long as critical levels of vaccination have not been reached to ensure heard immunity, and new SARS-CoV-2 strains are developing, the only realistic way to reduce the infection speed in a population is to track the infected individuals before they pass on the virus. Testing the population via sampling has shown good results in slowing the epidemic spread. Sampling can be implemented at different times during the epidemic and may be done either per individual or for combined groups of people at a time. The work we present here makes two main contributions. We first extend and refine our scalable agent-based COVID-19 simulator to incorporate an improved socio-demographic model which considers professions, as well as a more realistic population mixing model based on contact matrices per country. These extensions are necessary to develop and test various sampling strategies in a scenario including the 62 largest cities in Spain; this is our second contribution. As part of the evaluation, we also analyze the impact of different parameters, such as testing frequency, quarantine time, percentage of quarantine breakers, or group testing, on sampling efficacy. Our results show that the most effective strategies are pooling, rapid antigen test campaigns, and requiring negative testing for access to public areas. The effectiveness of all these strategies can be greatly increased by reducing the number of contacts for infected individual.

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“…The social model reproduces the characteristics of the population that is being simulated, including the demographic data, daily activities, and interaction patterns. The experiments we report on in this paper are for the Madrid province which has about 5 million individuals, based on demographic data from the Spanish census [3]. Daily activities are structured around work/study time, leisure time, and family time.…”

Section: 1-simulator Overviewmentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluation of Vaccination Strategies for the metropolitan area of Madrid

Singh

Lucerón²,

Sánchez³

et al. 2021

Preprint

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BackgroundThis work analyses the impact of different vaccination strategies on the propagation of COVID-19 within the Madrid metropolitan area starting the 27th of December 2020 and ending in the Summer of 2021. The predictions are based on simulation using EpiGraph, an agent-based COVID-19 simulator.MethodsWe briefly summarize the different interconnected models of EpiGraph and then we provide a comprehensive description of the vaccination model. We evaluate different vaccination strategies, and we validate the simulator by comparing the simulation results with real data from the metropolitan area of Madrid during the third wave.ResultsWe consider the different COVID-19 propagation scenarios on a social environment consisting of the ten largest cities in the Madrid metropolitan area, with 5 million individuals. The results show that the strategy that fares best is to vaccinate the elderly first with the two doses spaced 56 days apart; this approach reduces the final infection rate and the number of deaths by an additional 6% and 3% with respect to vaccinating the elderly first at the interval between doses recommended by the vaccine producer.ConclusionResults show that prioritizing the vaccination of young individuals would significantly increase the number of deaths. On the other hand, spacing out the first and second dose by 56 days would result in a slight reduction in the number of infections and deaths. The reason is the increase in the number of vaccinated individuals at any time during the simulation.

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Simulation of COVID-19 Propagation Scenarios in the Madrid Metropolitan Area

Cited by 21 publications

References 47 publications

Mask Wearing as Cultural Behavior: An Investigation Across 45 U.S. States During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Mask Wearing as Cultural Behavior: An Investigation Across 45 U.S. States During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Assessing population-sampling strategies for reducing the COVID-19 incidence

Evaluation of Vaccination Strategies for the metropolitan area of Madrid

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