IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/glh/wpfacu/116.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

On the Scaling Patterns of Infectious Disease Incidence in Cities

Author

Listed:
  • Oscar Patterson-Lomba

    (Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health)

  • Andres Gomez-Lievano

    (Center for International Development at Harvard University)

Abstract

Urban areas with larger and more connected populations offer an auspicious environment for contagion processes such as the spread of pathogens. Empirical evidence reveals a systematic increase in the rates of certain sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) with larger urban population size. However, the main drivers of these systemic infection patterns are still not well understood, and rampant urbanization rates worldwide makes it critical to advance our understanding on this front. Using confirmed-cases data for three STDs in US metropolitan areas, we investigate the scaling patterns of infectious disease incidence in urban areas. The most salient features of these patterns are that, on average, the incidence of infectious diseases that transmit with less ease– either because of a lower inherent transmissibility or due to a less suitable environment for transmission– scale more steeply with population size, are less predictable across time and more variable across cities of similar size. These features are explained, first, using a simple mathematical model of contagion, and then through the lens of a new theory of urban scaling. These frameworks help us reveal the links between the factors that determine the transmissibility of infectious diseases and the properties of their scaling patterns across cities.

Suggested Citation

  • Oscar Patterson-Lomba & Andres Gomez-Lievano, 2018. "On the Scaling Patterns of Infectious Disease Incidence in Cities," Growth Lab Working Papers 116, Harvard's Growth Lab.
    • Handle: RePEc:glh:wpfacu:116
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://growthlab.cid.harvard.edu/files/growthlab/files/infectious_disease_incidence_rfwp_94.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Cesar A. Hidalgo & Ricardo Hausmann, 2009. "The Building Blocks of Economic Complexity," Papers 0909.3890, arXiv.org.
    2. Duncan J. Watts & Steven H. Strogatz, 1998. "Collective dynamics of ‘small-world’ networks," Nature, Nature, vol. 393(6684), pages 440-442, June.
    3. Galea, Sandro & Freudenberg, Nicholas & Vlahov, David, 2005. "Cities and population health," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 60(5), pages 1017-1033, March.
    4. Andres Gomez-Lievano & Oscar Patterson-Lomba & Ricardo Hausmann, 2017. "Explaining the prevalence, scaling and variance of urban phenomena," Nature Human Behaviour, Nature, vol. 1(1), pages 1-6, January.
    5. Lönnroth, Knut & Jaramillo, Ernesto & Williams, Brian G. & Dye, Christopher & Raviglione, Mario, 2009. "Drivers of tuberculosis epidemics: The role of risk factors and social determinants," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 68(12), pages 2240-2246, June.
    6. Semaan, Salaam & Sternberg, Maya & Zaidi, Akbar & Aral, Sevgi O., 2007. "Social capital and rates of gonorrhea and syphilis in the United States: Spatial regression analyses of state-level associations," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 64(11), pages 2324-2341, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Oscar Patterson-Lomba & Andres Gomez-Lievano, 2018. "On the Scaling Patterns of Infectious Disease Incidence in Cities," CID Working Papers 94a, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    2. Balland, Pierre-Alexandre & Broekel, Tom & Diodato, Dario & Giuliani, Elisa & Hausmann, Ricardo & O'Clery, Neave & Rigby, David, 2022. "Reprint of The new paradigm of economic complexity," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(8).
    3. Vu, Trung V., 2020. "Economic complexity and health outcomes: A global perspective," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 265(C).
    4. Mewes, Lars & Broekel, Tom, 2022. "Technological complexity and economic growth of regions," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(8).
    5. Önder Nomaler & Bart Verspagen, 2024. "Complexity Research in Economics: Past, Present, and Future," Springer Books, in: Yao Ouyang & Richard R. Nelson & Horst Hanusch (ed.), Technological Revolution and New Driving Forces for Global Sustainable Development, chapter 0, pages 109-124, Springer.
    6. Andres Gomez-Lievano & Michail Fragkias, 2024. "The benefits and costs of agglomeration: insights from economics and complexity," Papers 2404.13178, arXiv.org.
    7. Li, Yang & Neffke, Frank M.H., 2024. "Evaluating the principle of relatedness: Estimation, drivers and implications for policy," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 53(3).
    8. Andres Gomez-Lievano, 2018. "Methods and Concepts in Economic Complexity," Papers 1809.10781, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2018.
    9. Yang Li & Frank Neffke, 2022. "Relatedness in regional development: in search of the right specification," Papers in Evolutionary Economic Geography (PEEG) 2208, Utrecht University, Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Group Economic Geography, revised Apr 2022.
    10. Andres Gomez-Lievano & Oscar Patterson-Lomba, 2018. "Estimating the drivers of urban economic complexity and their connection to economic performance," Papers 1812.02842, arXiv.org, revised Sep 2021.
    11. Xia, Qifan & Du, Debin & Cao, Wanpeng & Li, Xiya, 2023. "Who is the core? Reveal the heterogeneity of global rare earth trade structure from the perspective of industrial chain," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    12. Eduardo Lora, 2016. "The Path to Labor Formality: Urban Agglomeration and the Emergence of Complex Industries," CID Working Papers 78, Center for International Development at Harvard University.
    13. Rebecca Katz & Sangeeta Mookherji & Morgan Kaminski & Vibhuti Haté & Julie E. Fischer, 2012. "Urban Governance of Disease," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 2(2), pages 1-13, April.
    14. Koen Frenken & Frank Neffke & Alje van Dam, 2023. "Capabilities, institutions and regional economic development: a proposed synthesis," Cambridge Journal of Regions, Economy and Society, Cambridge Political Economy Society, vol. 16(3), pages 405-416.
    15. Koen Frenken & Frank Neffke, 2024. "Economic Geography and Complexity Theory," Papers in Evolutionary Economic Geography (PEEG) 2431, Utrecht University, Department of Human Geography and Spatial Planning, Group Economic Geography, revised Oct 2024.
    16. Balland, Pierre-Alexandre & Broekel, Tom & Diodato, Dario & Giuliani, Elisa & Hausmann, Ricardo & O'Clery, Neave & Rigby, David, 2022. "The new paradigm of economic complexity," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(3).
    17. Kumar, Sanjesh & Singh, Baljeet, 2019. "Barriers to the international diffusion of technological innovations," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 82(C), pages 74-86.
    18. Thorvaldur Gylfason, 2019. "Inequality Undermines Democracy and Growth," CESifo Working Paper Series 7486, CESifo.
    19. Qiliang Mao & Xianzhuang Mao, 2021. "Cultural barriers, institutional distance, and spatial spillovers: Evidence from regional industrial evolution in China," Growth and Change, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 52(3), pages 1440-1481, September.
    20. Kazemzadeh, Emad & Fuinhas, José Alberto & Koengkan, Matheus & Shadmehri, Mohammad Taher Ahmadi, 2023. "Relationship between the share of renewable electricity consumption, economic complexity, financial development, and oil prices: A two-step club convergence and PVAR model approach," International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 260-275.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    cities; infectious diseases;

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:glh:wpfacu:116. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chuck McKenney (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://growthlab.hks.harvard.edu/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.