Resilience of mobility network to dynamic population response across COVID-19 interventions: evidences from Chile

Abstract

Background The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the importance of non-traditional data sources, such as mobile phone data, to inform effective public health interventions and monitor adherence to such measures. Previous studies showed how socioeconomic characteristics shaped population response during restrictions and how repeated interventions eroded adherence over time. Less is known about how different population strata changed their response to repeated interventions and how this impacted the resulting mobility network.
Methods We study population response during the first and second infection waves of the COVID-19 pandemic in Chile and Spain. Via spatial lag and regression models, we investigate the adherence to mobility interventions at the municipality level in Chile, highlighting the significant role of wealth, labor structure, COVID-19 incidence, and network metrics characterizing business-asusual municipality connectivity in shaping mobility changes during the two waves. We assess network structural similarities in the two periods by defining mobility hotspots and traveling probabilities in the two countries. As a proof of concept, we simulate and compare outcomes of an epidemic diffusion occurring in the two waves.
Results While differences exist between factors associated with mobility reduction across waves in Chile, underscoring the dynamic nature of population response, our analysis reveals the resilience of the mobility network across the two waves. We test the robustness of our findings recovering similar results for Spain. Finally, epidemic modeling suggests that historical mobility data from past waves can be leveraged to inform future disease spatial invasion models in repeated interventions.
Conclusions This study highlights the value of historical mobile phone data for building pandemic preparedness and lessens the need for real-time data streams for risk assessment and outbreak response. Our work provides valuable insights into the complex interplay of factors driving mobility across repeated interventions, aiding in developing targeted mitigation strategies.