On the effectiveness of communication strategies as non-pharmaceutical interventions to tackle epidemics

PLoS One. 2021 Oct 29;16(10):e0257995. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0257995. eCollection 2021.

Abstract

When pharmaceutical interventions are unavailable to deal with an epidemic outbreak, adequate management of communication strategies can be key to reduce the contagion risks. On the one hand, accessibility to trustworthy and timely information, whilst on the other, the adoption of preventive behaviors may be both crucial. However, despite the abundance of communication strategies, their effectiveness has been scarcely evaluated or merely circumscribed to the scrutiny of public affairs. To study the influence of communication strategies on the spreading dynamics of an infectious disease, we implemented a susceptible-exposed-infected-removed-dead (SEIRD) epidemiological model, using an agent-based approach. Agents in our systems can obtain information modulating their behavior from two sources: (i) through the local interaction with other neighboring agents and, (ii) from a central entity delivering information with a certain periodicity. In doing so, we highlight how global information delivered from a central entity can reduce the impact of an infectious disease and how informing even a small fraction of the population has a remarkable impact, when compared to not informing the population at all. Moreover, having a scheme of delivering daily messages makes a stark difference on the reduction of cases, compared to the other evaluated strategies, denoting that daily delivery of information produces the largest decrease in the number of cases. Furthermore, when the information spreading relies only on local interactions between agents, and no central entity takes actions along the dynamics, then the epidemic spreading is virtually independent of the initial amount of informed agents. On top of that, we found that local communication plays an important role in an intermediate regime where information coming from a central entity is scarce. As a whole, our results highlight the importance of proper communication strategies, both accurate and daily, to tackle epidemic outbreaks.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Africa, Western / epidemiology
  • COVID-19 / prevention & control
  • Communication*
  • Ebolavirus*
  • Epidemics / prevention & control*
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / epidemiology*
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / prevention & control*
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / transmission
  • Hemorrhagic Fever, Ebola / virology
  • Humans
  • Models, Statistical*
  • Quarantine / methods*
  • Social Behavior

Grants and funding

This work was partially supported by the Programa de Apoyo a Centros con Financiamiento Basal AFB 170004 to Fundación Ciencia & Vida (www.cienciavida.org) and the Instituto Milenio Centro Interdisciplinario de Neurociencia de Valparaíso ICM-ECONOMIA P09-022-F (cinv.uv.cl). This material is based upon work supported by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research under award number FA9550-20-1-0196. AB acknowledges FIB-UV scholarship from Universidad de Valparaíso (www.uv.cl). AJM acknowledges support from the Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo de Chile (ANID) under Grant No. 3190906 (www.anid.cl). The authors also acknowledge the National Laboratory for High Performance Computing (NLHPC), Universidad de Chile. Powered@NLHPC. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.