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Sexual contacts and epidemic thresholds

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  • James Holland Jones

    (Center for Statistics and the Social Sciences, and Center for AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases, University of Washington)

  • Mark S. Handcock

    (Center for Statistics and the Social Sciences, and Center for AIDS and Sexually Transmitted Diseases, University of Washington)

Abstract

Distributions of the number of sexual partners reported in surveys show a pronounced skew, with most people having had one or no partners in the past year and a small fraction having had many1,2. Liljeros and colleagues3 infer from the results of a Swedish survey that there is a "scale-free" population distribution of sexual contacts, consistent with a preferential-attachment model3,4, in which “the rich get richer” and epidemics are driven by extremely promiscuous individuals. Here we reanalyse the data from Sweden and from other countries, using more appropriate statistical tools. Our findings support the conventional wisdom that epidemic thresholds exist in these populations, and indicate that current public-health strategies to reduce the spread of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections do not need to be radically refocused.

Suggested Citation

  • James Holland Jones & Mark S. Handcock, 2003. "Sexual contacts and epidemic thresholds," Nature, Nature, vol. 423(6940), pages 605-606, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:nature:v:423:y:2003:i:6940:d:10.1038_423605a
    DOI: 10.1038/423605a
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    Cited by:

    1. Shah Jamal Alam & Ruth Meyer & Gina Ziervogel & Scott Moss, 2007. "The Impact of HIV/AIDS in the Context of Socioeconomic Stressors: an Evidence-Driven Approach," Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, Journal of Artificial Societies and Social Simulation, vol. 10(4), pages 1-7.
    2. Wang, Jun & Cai, Shimin & Wang, Wei & Zhou, Tao, 2023. "Link cooperation effect of cooperative epidemics on complex networks," Applied Mathematics and Computation, Elsevier, vol. 437(C).
    3. Yang, Meng & Chen, Guanrong & Fu, Xinchu, 2011. "A modified SIS model with an infective medium on complex networks and its global stability," Physica A: Statistical Mechanics and its Applications, Elsevier, vol. 390(12), pages 2408-2413.
    4. Markus M. Mobius & Neel Rao & Tanya Rosenblat, 2007. "Social networks and vaccination decisions," Working Papers 07-12, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston.
    5. Kai Gong & Ming Tang & Pak Ming Hui & Hai Feng Zhang & Do Younghae & Ying-Cheng Lai, 2013. "An Efficient Immunization Strategy for Community Networks," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 8(12), pages 1-11, December.
    6. Rodriguez-Avi, J. & Conde-Sanchez, A. & Saez-Castillo, A.J. & Olmo-Jimenez, M.J., 2007. "A new generalization of the Waring distribution," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 51(12), pages 6138-6150, August.

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