COVID-19 Superspreading Suggests Mitigation by Social Network Modulation

Although COVID-19 has caused severe suffering globally, the efficacy of nonpharmaceutical interventions has been greater than typical models have predicted. Meanwhile, evidence is mounting that the pandemic is characterized by superspreading. Capturing this phenomenon theoretically requires modeling at the scale of individuals. Using a mathematical model, we show that superspreading drastically enhances mitigations which reduce the overall personal contact number and that social clustering increases this effect.

Automated summary

Although COVID-19 has caused severe suffering globally, the efficacy of nonpharmaceutical interventions has been greater than typical models have predicted. Evidence is mounting that the pandemic is characterized by superspreading, which requires modeling at the scale of individuals. Using a mathematical model, it is shown that superspreading drastically enhances mitigations which reduce the overall personal contact number, with social clustering further increasing this effect.