http://www.thelancet.com/article/S0140673621028671/pdf

Variation in the COVID-19 infection–fatality ratio by age, time, and geography during the pre-vaccine era: a systematic analysis

Human mobility behavior in COVID-19: A systematic literature review and bibliometric analysis

/pdf/oup-accepted-manuscript-3tm3yis5.pdf

OUP accepted manuscript

Public transport for smart cities: Recent innovations and future challenges

The future dynamics of the Corona Virus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) outbreak in African countries is largely unclear. Simultaneously, required strengths of intervention measures are strongly debated because containing COVID-19 in favor of the weak health care system largely conflicts with socio-economic hardships. Here we analyze the impact of interventions on outbreak dynamics for South Africa, exhibiting the largest case numbers across sub-saharan Africa, before and after their national lockdown. Past data indicate strongly reduced but still supracritical growth after lockdown. Moreover, large-scale agent-based simulations given different future scenarios for the Nelson Mandela Bay Municipality with 1.14 million inhabitants, based on detailed activity and mobility survey data of about 10% of the population, similarly suggest that current containment may be insufficient to not overload local intensive care capacity. Yet, enduring, slightly stronger or more specific interventions, combined with sufficient compliance, may constitute a viable option for interventions for South Africa.

/pdf/covid-19-in-south-africa-outbreak-despite-interventions-4brrgy0ixz.pdf

COVID-19 in South Africa: outbreak despite interventions.

Disruptive developments in automated driving systems, new powertrain concepts and digital mobility are shaping changes in the way people move in rural and urban areas. In combination with these technical potentials, novel mobility concepts as for instance demand responsive transportation (DRT) can improve the everyday mobility of people in terms of both cost-efficiency and sustainability. Moreover, challenges related to demographic transitions and urbanisation can be addressed and negative developments mitigated. One potential application of DRT might be the connection of rural areas with the urban core. The following paper aims to evaluate the viability and feasibility of DRT systems in the interplay of rural and urban areas. The city of Bremerhaven and the immediate surrounding are selected as area of investigation and the agent-based modelling framework MATSim is used to simulate the inhabitant mobility behaviour. On this basis, the global operational costs are calculated for different scenarios, e.g. fully automated vehicles and various powertrain types. The results imply that automated DRT systems are applicable to reduce the economic and environmental costs of transportation when applied in the interplay of rural and urban areas.

Impact assessment of autonomous demand responsive transport as a link between urban and rural areas

Tuberculosis (TB) is the 10th leading cause of death worldwide, and since 2007 it has been the main cause of death from a single infectious agent, ranking above HIV/AIDS. The current COVID-19 is a pandemic which caused many deaths around the world. The danger is not only a coinfection as observed for TB and HIV for a long time, but that both TB and SARS-CoV-2 affect the respiratory organs and thus potentiate their effect or accelerate the critical course. A key public health priority during the emergence of a novel pathogen is the estimation of the clinical need to assure adequate medical treatment. This requires a correct adjustment to the critical case detection rate and the prediction of possible scenarios based on known patterns. The African continent faces constraining preconditions in regard to healthcare capacities and social welfare which may hinder required countermeasures. However, given the high TB prevalence rates, COVID-19 may show a particular severe course in respective African countries, e.g. South Africa. Using WHO's TB and public infrastructure data, we conservatively estimate that the symptomatic critical case rate, which affects the healthcare system, is between 8 and 12% due to the interaction of COVID-19 and TB, for a TB population of 0.52% in South Africa. This TB prevalence leads to a significant increase in the peak load of critical cases of COVID-19 patients and potentially exceeds current healthcare capacities.

/pdf/anticipating-the-impact-of-covid19-and-comorbidities-on-the-3e5tat888b.pdf

Moritz Kersting

Papers

COVID-19 in South Africa: outbreak despite interventions.

Impact assessment of autonomous demand responsive transport as a link between urban and rural areas

Anticipating the impact of COVID19 and comorbidities on the South African healthcare system by agent-based simulations.