Spatiotemporal Differences of COVID-19 Infection among Healthcare Workers and Patients in China from January to March 2020

TL;DR

This study analyzes the spatiotemporal differences in COVID-19 infection patterns between healthcare workers and patients across different regions in China during early 2020, informing targeted containment strategies.

Contribution

It uniquely compares infection dynamics between healthcare workers and patients across multiple regions, highlighting differences in temporal and spatial patterns during the initial outbreak.

Findings

Higher early-stage infection rates among healthcare workers

Greater temporal differences in Wuhan compared to other regions

Spatial distribution of healthcare worker infections reflects epidemic spread

Abstract

Studying the spatiotemporal differences in coronavirus disease (COVID-19) between social groups such as healthcare workers (HCWs) and patients can aid in formulating epidemic containment policies. Most previous studies of the spatiotemporal characteristics of COVID-19 were conducted in a single group and did not explore the differences between groups. To fill this research gap, this study assessed the spatiotemporal characteristics and differences among patients and HCWs infection in Wuhan, Hubei (excluding Wuhan), and China (excluding Hubei). The temporal difference was greater in Wuhan than in the rest of Hubei, and was greater in Hubei (excluding Wuhan) than in the rest of China. The incidence was high in healthcare workers in the early stages of the epidemic. Therefore, it is important to strengthen the protective measures for healthcare workers in the early stage of the epidemic. The spatial difference was less in Wuhan than in the rest of Hubei, and less in Hubei (excluding Wuhan) than in the rest of China. The spatial distribution of healthcare worker infections can be used to infer the spatial distribution of the epidemic in the early stage and to formulate control measures accordingly.