Previously submitted to: JMIR Medical Informatics (no longer under consideration since Jun 28, 2020)
Date Submitted: May 15, 2020
Warning: This is an author submission that is not peer-reviewed or edited. Preprints - unless they show as "accepted" - should not be relied on to guide clinical practice or health-related behavior and should not be reported in news media as established information.
Tracking of People Behavior Changes in China during COVID-19 Pandemic
ABSTRACT
Background:
While most countries implemented measures to reduce people activities and gathering to contain the coronavirus, the outcome may vary significantly depending on how and to what extent people behaviors have been changed.
Objective:
This study aims to investigate and quantify how people behavior was changing in China since the COVID-19 outbreak. The results are helpful for related research and policy making in better understanding the effect of people behavior changes on virus transmission.
Methods:
We conducted a survey of 1,048 people in five major cities in China to track and quantify the behavior changes in different periods since the outbreak.
Results:
It is found that there was nearly 80% reduction of out-of-home activities (working, eating, shopping, taking public transportation, and travelling) during the peak period. Such activities are gradually increasing after the easing of containment measures but still significantly below pre-outbreak level.
Conclusions:
The significant behavior changes have contributed to the rapid control of virus transmission in China. While countries are reopening the economies before the virus disappears, the system and capacity of testing and contact tracing should be carefully designed with the tracking of people behavior changes in the future.
Citation
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