Dataset Information

Social contact patterns and implications for infectious disease transmission - a systematic review and meta-analysis of contact surveys.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Transmission of respiratory pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2 depends on patterns of contact and mixing across populations. Understanding this is crucial to predict pathogen spread and the effectiveness of control efforts. Most analyses of contact patterns to date have focused on high-income settings.

Methods

Here, we conduct a systematic review and individual-participant meta-analysis of surveys carried out in low- and middle-income countries and compare patterns of contact in these settings to surveys previously carried out in high-income countries. Using individual-level data from 28,503 participants and 413,069 contacts across 27 surveys, we explored how contact characteristics (number, location, duration, and whether physical) vary across income settings.

Results

Contact rates declined with age in high- and upper-middle-income settings, but not in low-income settings, where adults aged 65+ made similar numbers of contacts as younger individuals and mixed with all age groups. Across all settings, increasing household size was a key determinant of contact frequency and characteristics, with low-income settings characterised by the largest, most intergenerational households. A higher proportion of contacts were made at home in low-income settings, and work/school contacts were more frequent in high-income strata. We also observed contrasting effects of gender across income strata on the frequency, duration, and type of contacts individuals made.

Conclusions

These differences in contact patterns between settings have material consequences for both spread of respiratory pathogens and the effectiveness of different non-pharmaceutical interventions.

Funding

This work is primarily being funded by joint Centre funding from the UK Medical Research Council and DFID (MR/R015600/1).

SUBMITTER: Mousa A

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8765757 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Nov

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Publications

Social contact patterns and implications for infectious disease transmission - a systematic review and meta-analysis of contact surveys.

Mousa Andria A Winskill Peter P Watson Oliver John OJ Ratmann Oliver O Monod Mélodie M Ajelli Marco M Diallo Aldiouma A Dodd Peter J PJ Grijalva Carlos G CG Kiti Moses Chapa MC Krishnan Anand A Kumar Rakesh R Kumar Supriya S Kwok Kin O KO Lanata Claudio F CF de Waroux Olivier Le Polain OLP Leung Kathy K Mahikul Wiriya W Melegaro Alessia A Morrow Carl D CD Mossong Joël J Neal Eleanor Fg EF Nokes D James DJ Pan-Ngum Wirichada W Potter Gail E GE Russell Fiona M FM Saha Siddhartha S Sugimoto Jonathan D JD Wei Wan In WI Wood Robin R RR Wu Joseph J Zhang Juanjuan J Walker Patrick P Whittaker Charles C

eLife 20211125

<h4>Background</h4>Transmission of respiratory pathogens such as SARS-CoV-2 depends on patterns of contact and mixing across populations. Understanding this is crucial to predict pathogen spread and the effectiveness of control efforts. Most analyses of contact patterns to date have focused on high-income settings.<h4>Methods</h4>Here, we conduct a systematic review and individual-participant meta-analysis of surveys carried out in low- and middle-income countries and compare patterns of contact ...[more]

PMID: 34821551

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Dataset Information

Social contact patterns and implications for infectious disease transmission - a systematic review and meta-analysis of contact surveys.

Background

Methods

Results

Conclusions

Funding

Publications

Social contact patterns and implications for infectious disease transmission - a systematic review and meta-analysis of contact surveys.

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