Strength and weakness of disease-induced herd immunity in networks

Fuente: arXiv
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Autori principali: Hiraoka, Takayuki, Ghadiri, Zahra, Rizi, Abbas K., Kivelä, Mikko, Saramäki, Jari
Natura: Preprint
Pubblicazione: 2023
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author Hiraoka, Takayuki
Ghadiri, Zahra
Rizi, Abbas K.
Kivelä, Mikko
Saramäki, Jari
author_facet Hiraoka, Takayuki
Ghadiri, Zahra
Rizi, Abbas K.
Kivelä, Mikko
Saramäki, Jari
contents When a fraction of a population becomes immune to an infectious disease, the population-wide infection risk decreases nonlinearly due to collective protection, known as herd immunity. Some studies based on mean-field models suggest that natural infection in a heterogeneous population may induce herd immunity more efficiently than homogeneous immunization. However, we theoretically show that this is not necessarily the case when the population is modeled as a network instead of using the mean-field approach. We identify two competing mechanisms driving disease-induced herd immunity in networks: the biased distribution of immunity toward socially active individuals enhances herd immunity, while the topological localization of immune individuals weakens it. The effect of localization is stronger in networks embedded in a low-dimensional space, which can make disease-induced immunity less effective than random immunization. Our results highlight the role of networks in shaping herd immunity and call for a careful examination of model predictions that inform public health policies.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2307_04700
institution arXiv
publishDate 2023
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Strength and weakness of disease-induced herd immunity in networks
Hiraoka, Takayuki
Ghadiri, Zahra
Rizi, Abbas K.
Kivelä, Mikko
Saramäki, Jari
Physics and Society
Populations and Evolution
When a fraction of a population becomes immune to an infectious disease, the population-wide infection risk decreases nonlinearly due to collective protection, known as herd immunity. Some studies based on mean-field models suggest that natural infection in a heterogeneous population may induce herd immunity more efficiently than homogeneous immunization. However, we theoretically show that this is not necessarily the case when the population is modeled as a network instead of using the mean-field approach. We identify two competing mechanisms driving disease-induced herd immunity in networks: the biased distribution of immunity toward socially active individuals enhances herd immunity, while the topological localization of immune individuals weakens it. The effect of localization is stronger in networks embedded in a low-dimensional space, which can make disease-induced immunity less effective than random immunization. Our results highlight the role of networks in shaping herd immunity and call for a careful examination of model predictions that inform public health policies.
title Strength and weakness of disease-induced herd immunity in networks
topic Physics and Society
Populations and Evolution
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2307.04700