JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Daily new cases dataset since January 2020 were used to search for evidences of SARS-CoV-2 community transmission as the main nowadays cause of constant infection rates among countries. Despite traditional forms of transmission of this virus (droplets and aerosols in medical facilities), new evidence suggests aerosols forming patterns in the atmosphere as a main factor of community transmission outside medical spaces. Following these findings, this research focused on comparing some countries and the adopted policy used as preventive framework for virus community transmission. Countries social distancing policy aspect, of one to two meters of physical distance, was statistically analyzed from January to early May 2020, and countries were divided into those implementing only social physical distance and those implementing distancing with additional transmission isolation (with masks and city disinfection). Correlating countries social distancing policy adoption with other preventive measures such as social isolation and COVID-19 testing, a new indicator results, derived from SIR models and Weibull parameterization, show that only social physical distance measure could act as a factor for SARS-CoV-2 transmission with respect to atmosphere carrier potential. In this sense, the type of social distancing framework adopted by some countries without additional measures might represent a main model for the constant reproductive spread patterns of SARS-CoV-2 within the community transmission. Finally, the findings have important implications for the policy making to be adopted globally as well as individual-scale preventive methods.