On the Effectiveness of Flight Ban Strategies in the Fight Against COVID-19 Variants of Concern
21 Pages Posted: 24 Feb 2022
Date Written: February 10, 2022
Abstract
Initial hopes for a quick disappearance of COVID-19 seem to fade away gradually, partially due to the emergence of new virus variants, which come with an inherent possibility for breakthrough infections. In this study, we take the recently emergent variant of concern B.1.1.529, labeled as Omicron by the WHO, as a motivating example for analyzing the possibilities flight bans provide for effectively containing the disease spreading process of such variants before they become widely spread. We compare several flight ban strategies including source-targeted bans, spatial neighbor bans, and flight neighbor bans, under varying simulation parameters. We hope that our results contribute to our aviation system becoming more pandemic-resilient.
Note:
Funding: This study is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 71731001).
Declaration of Interests: None to declare.
Keywords: COVID-19, pandemics, air transportation, variants of concern
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