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A data driven agent-based model that recommends non-pharmaceutical interventions to suppress Coronavirus disease 2019 resurgence in megacities

A data driven agent-based model that recommends non-pharmaceutical interventions to suppress Coronavirus disease 2019 resurgence in megacities
A data driven agent-based model that recommends non-pharmaceutical interventions to suppress Coronavirus disease 2019 resurgence in megacities

Before herd immunity against Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is achieved by mass vaccination, science-based guidelines for non-pharmaceutical interventions are urgently needed to reopen megacities. This study integrated massive mobile phone tracking records, census data and building characteristics into a spatially explicit agent-based model to simulate COVID-19 spread among 11.2 million individuals living in Shenzhen City, China. After validation by local epidemiological observations, the model was used to assess the probability of COVID-19 resurgence if sporadic cases occurred in a fully reopened city. Combined scenarios of three critical non-pharmaceutical interventions (contact tracing, mask wearing and prompt testing) were assessed at various levels of public compliance. Our results show a greater than 50% chance of disease resurgence if the city reopened without contact tracing. However, tracing household contacts, in combination with mandatory mask use and prompt testing, could suppress the probability of resurgence under 5% within four weeks. If household contact tracing could be expanded to work/class group members, the COVID resurgence could be avoided if 80% of the population wear facemasks and 40% comply with prompt testing. Our assessment, including modelling for different scenarios, helps public health practitioners tailor interventions within Shenzhen City and other world megacities under a variety of suppression timelines, risk tolerance, healthcare capacity and public compliance.

COVID-19, agent-based model, contact tracing, facemask, mobile phone data, testing
1742-5689
Yin, Ling
fe6cda57-b1f7-4adb-878a-fa9909bba1bf
Zhang, Hao
ca685e81-2422-49aa-a811-5dc9a250d276
Li, Yuan
45623fff-53f0-4afb-b163-539841ac7dc1
Liu, Kang
806457ef-1b75-4f94-beaf-576b7f3934b9
Chen, Tianmu
8b0f6838-9ad6-4044-ae61-da77be75d202
Luo, Wei
82e9edb3-57e2-4ccb-b838-5248a839b1eb
Lai, Shengjie
b57a5fe8-cfb6-4fa7-b414-a98bb891b001
Li, Ye
1fd83968-1f34-4efc-a255-049aafb2cd02
Tang, Xiujuan
9a7200da-7cb3-4bb9-ac4e-19e1f434bfbe
Ning, Li
5f8e00a1-7b76-4756-8b62-db620f1bea0f
Feng, Shengzhong
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Wei, Yanjie
1e9ff7ac-9c43-4df9-a265-be1a5f81ec54
Zhao, Zhiyuan
e32809b0-a011-4944-b921-087be042a238
Wen, Ying
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Mao, Liang
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Mei, Shujiang
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Yin, Ling
fe6cda57-b1f7-4adb-878a-fa9909bba1bf
Zhang, Hao
ca685e81-2422-49aa-a811-5dc9a250d276
Li, Yuan
45623fff-53f0-4afb-b163-539841ac7dc1
Liu, Kang
806457ef-1b75-4f94-beaf-576b7f3934b9
Chen, Tianmu
8b0f6838-9ad6-4044-ae61-da77be75d202
Luo, Wei
82e9edb3-57e2-4ccb-b838-5248a839b1eb
Lai, Shengjie
b57a5fe8-cfb6-4fa7-b414-a98bb891b001
Li, Ye
1fd83968-1f34-4efc-a255-049aafb2cd02
Tang, Xiujuan
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Ning, Li
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Feng, Shengzhong
3ddc236b-4384-46f6-bdd0-7607384cc8c1
Wei, Yanjie
1e9ff7ac-9c43-4df9-a265-be1a5f81ec54
Zhao, Zhiyuan
e32809b0-a011-4944-b921-087be042a238
Wen, Ying
2a23beeb-7a79-4177-a050-e94d1a75268a
Mao, Liang
f9a15756-13fb-4110-af53-021876aa69fa
Mei, Shujiang
4359c258-f0ea-44fe-a8d3-41409ea5be71

Yin, Ling, Zhang, Hao, Li, Yuan, Liu, Kang, Chen, Tianmu, Luo, Wei, Lai, Shengjie, Li, Ye, Tang, Xiujuan, Ning, Li, Feng, Shengzhong, Wei, Yanjie, Zhao, Zhiyuan, Wen, Ying, Mao, Liang and Mei, Shujiang (2021) A data driven agent-based model that recommends non-pharmaceutical interventions to suppress Coronavirus disease 2019 resurgence in megacities. Journal of the Royal Society Interface, 18 (181), [20210112]. (doi:10.1098/rsif.2021.0112).

Record type: Article

Abstract

Before herd immunity against Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is achieved by mass vaccination, science-based guidelines for non-pharmaceutical interventions are urgently needed to reopen megacities. This study integrated massive mobile phone tracking records, census data and building characteristics into a spatially explicit agent-based model to simulate COVID-19 spread among 11.2 million individuals living in Shenzhen City, China. After validation by local epidemiological observations, the model was used to assess the probability of COVID-19 resurgence if sporadic cases occurred in a fully reopened city. Combined scenarios of three critical non-pharmaceutical interventions (contact tracing, mask wearing and prompt testing) were assessed at various levels of public compliance. Our results show a greater than 50% chance of disease resurgence if the city reopened without contact tracing. However, tracing household contacts, in combination with mandatory mask use and prompt testing, could suppress the probability of resurgence under 5% within four weeks. If household contact tracing could be expanded to work/class group members, the COVID resurgence could be avoided if 80% of the population wear facemasks and 40% comply with prompt testing. Our assessment, including modelling for different scenarios, helps public health practitioners tailor interventions within Shenzhen City and other world megacities under a variety of suppression timelines, risk tolerance, healthcare capacity and public compliance.

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More information

Submitted date: 4 February 2021
Accepted/In Press date: 2 August 2021
Published date: 25 August 2021
Additional Information: Funding Information: Data accessibility. Mobile phone data were provided by the Shenzhen Transportation Operation Command Center (Contact: Binliang Li, 240854198@qq.com). Travel survey data, building survey data and census data were offered by the Planning and Natural Resources Bureau of Shenzhen Municipality (Contact: Renrong Jiang, jiangren-rong@126.com). The epidemic surveillance data were provided by the Shenzhen Center for Disease Control and Prevention (Contact: Shu-jiang Mei, sjmei66@163.com). Researchers who meet the criteria for access to confidential data can send requests to the above local government departments. The daily confirmed cases of COVID-19 are publicly accessible from the Shenzhen Municipal Health Commission (http://wjw.sz.gov.cn/yqxx/). Baidu migration data can be openly obtained from http://qianxi.baidu.com/. Authors’ contributions. L.Y., H.Z., L.M. and S.M. conceived the study. Y.L.1, S.M., L.Y., H.Z., X.T., Y.W., Y.L.2, L.N. and Z.Z. collected and analysed data for the model. L.Y., H.Z., L.M., K.L., T.C., S.M., S.L. and W.L. developed the model. H.Z. programmed the model and produced the output. S.F. and Y.W. improved the model in high-performance computing environment. L.N. and H.Z. created the visualization video. L.Y., H.Z., L.M., S.M., Y.L.1 and K.L. interpreted the results and wrote the manuscript. W.L., S.L., T.C. and Y.L.2 edited and revised the manuscript. All authors read and approved the manuscript. Y.L.1 is Yuan Li. Y.L.2 is Ye Li. Competing interests. The authors declare no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship and/or publication of this article. Funding. This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. 41771441, 41901391 and 81773498); R & D project of key areas in Guangdong Province (grant no. 2020B111107001); Natural Science Foundation of Guangdong Province, China (grant no. 2021A1515011191); Major science and technology projects of Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region (grant no. 2020A03004-4); Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Seattle, WA (grant nos. INV-005834 and INV-024911); National University of Singapore Start-up Grant (grant no. WBS R-109-000-270-133); and the Joint Engineering Research Center for Health Big Data Intelligent Analysis Technology. Acknowledgements. The authors would like to thank the National Supercomputing Center in Shenzhen for providing high-performance computing cluster environment in a timely manner. The authors also thank the anonymous reviewers for their valuable suggestions. Publisher Copyright: © 2021 The Authors.
Keywords: COVID-19, agent-based model, contact tracing, facemask, mobile phone data, testing

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 451142
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/451142
ISSN: 1742-5689
PURE UUID: 26d8c981-054a-42e2-9df6-0908201381fe
ORCID for Shengjie Lai: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-9781-8148

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Date deposited: 14 Sep 2021 15:15
Last modified: 17 Mar 2024 03:52

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Contributors

Author: Ling Yin
Author: Hao Zhang
Author: Yuan Li
Author: Kang Liu
Author: Tianmu Chen
Author: Wei Luo
Author: Shengjie Lai ORCID iD
Author: Ye Li
Author: Xiujuan Tang
Author: Li Ning
Author: Shengzhong Feng
Author: Yanjie Wei
Author: Zhiyuan Zhao
Author: Ying Wen
Author: Liang Mao
Author: Shujiang Mei

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