# Confinement tonicity on epidemic spreading

## TL;DR

This paper introduces 'confinement tonicity' to model how easing quarantine affects the spread of infectious diseases.

## Contribution

The novel concept of confinement tonicity is introduced to quantify the impact of quarantine easing on disease spread.

## Key findings

- Confinement tonicity measures the net flow between confined and deconfined populations.
- Numerical results show how abrupt lifting of restrictions can lead to new infection waves.
- The model provides insights into managing quarantine policies to prevent disease resurgence.

## Abstract

Emerging and re-emerging pathogens are latent threats in our society with the risk of killing millions of people worldwide, without forgetting the severe economic and educational backlogs. From COVID-19, we learned that self isolation and quarantine restrictions (confinement) were the main way of protection till availability of vaccines. However, abrupt lifting of social confinement would result in new waves of new infection cases and high death tolls. Here, inspired by how an extracellular solution can make water move into or out of a cell through osmosis, we define confinement tonicity. This can serve as a standalone measurement for the net direction and magnitude of flows between the confined and deconfined susceptible compartments. Numerical results offer insights on the effects of easing quarantine restrictions.