Urbanization affects peak timing, prevalence, and bimodality of influenza pandemics in Australia: results of a census-calibrated model

TL;DR

This study uses a detailed simulation model to analyze how urbanization in Australia influences influenza pandemic patterns, revealing increased prevalence, faster spread, and reduced bimodality over time.

Contribution

It introduces a census-calibrated influenza transmission model to quantify the impact of urbanization on pandemic dynamics in Australia.

Findings

Increased peak prevalence over time

Faster pandemic spreading rates

Decreased bimodality in pandemic patterns

Abstract

We examine salient trends of influenza pandemics in Australia, a rapidly urbanizing nation. To do so, we implement state-of-the-art influenza transmission and progression models within a large-scale stochastic computer simulation, generated using comprehensive Australian census datasets from 2006, 2011, and 2016. Our results offer a simulation-based investigation of a population's sensitivity to pandemics across multiple historical time points, and highlight three significant trends in pandemic patterns over the years: increased peak prevalence, faster spreading rates, and decreasing spatiotemporal bimodality. We attribute these pandemic trends to increases in two key quantities indicative of urbanization: population fraction residing in major cities, and international air traffic. In addition, we identify features of the pandemic's geographic spread that we attribute to changes in the commuter mobility network. The generic nature of our model and the ubiquity of urbanization trends around the world make it likely for our results to be applicable in other rapidly urbanizing nations.