Individual and neighborhood based socioeconomic factors relevant for contact behaviour and epidemic control.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Identifying sources of heterogeneity in contact patterns is key to inform disease transmission models. Recent works have investigated how individual-based socio-economic factors, besides age, affect contact behavior, but neglected the individuals' area of living. Here, we aim at estimating contact matrices stratified by both individual-based and area-based socio-economic factors.

Methods

We use social contact data from Switzerland collected in 2021, combined with a neighborhood-based index of socio-economic position (SEP). Despite lacking socio-economic information on the contacts, we develop a method to reconstruct contact matrices fully stratified by age, education level, and SEP, with varying assortativity levels.

Results

We find a positive association b

SUBMITTER: Di Domenico L 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12808736 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature