2010/06/14 by Luis E. C. Rocha, Fredrik Liljeros, Rocha, Luis Enrique Correa +3 · 1 citation
Health Professions · Physics and Astronomy · Mathematics · #Adolescent Sexual and Reproductive Health #Complex Network Analysis Techniques #COVID-19 epidemiological studies
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1006.2856
We study implications of the dynamical and spatial contact structure between\nBrazilian escorts and sex-buyers for the spreading of sexually transmitted\ninfections (STI). Despite a highly skewed degree distribution diseases\nspreading in this contact structure have rather well-defined epidemic\nthresholds. Temporal effects create a broad distribution of outbreak sizes even\nif the transmission probability is taken to the hypothetical value of 100%.\nTemporal correlations speed up outbreaks, especially in the early phase,\ncompared to randomized contact structures. The time-ordering and the network\ntopology, on the other hand, slow down the epidemics. Studying compartmental\nmodels we show that the contact structure can probably not support the spread\nof HIV, not even if individuals were sexually active during the acute\ninfection. We investigate hypothetical means of containing an outbreak and find\nthat travel restrictions are about as efficient as removal of the vertices of\nhighest degree. In general, the type of commercial sex we study seems not like\na major factor in STI epidemics.\n