Evidence that coronavirus superspreading is fat-tailed

Superspreaders, infected individuals who result in an outsized number of secondary cases, are believed to underlie a significant fraction of total SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Here, we combine empirical observations of SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 transmission and extreme value statistics to show that the di...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences - PNAS 2020-11, Vol.117 (47), p.29416-29418
Main Authors: Wong, Felix, Collins, James J.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Basic Reproduction Number - statistics & numerical data
Biological Sciences
BRIEF REPORTS
Coronaviruses
COVID-19 - epidemiology
COVID-19 - transmission
Disease control
Disease transmission
Extreme values
Humans
Models, Statistical
Pandemics - statistics & numerical data
Physical Sciences
Severe acute respiratory syndrome
Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2
Viral diseases
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Summary:Superspreaders, infected individuals who result in an outsized number of secondary cases, are believed to underlie a significant fraction of total SARS-CoV-2 transmission. Here, we combine empirical observations of SARS-CoV and SARS-CoV-2 transmission and extreme value statistics to show that the distribution of secondary cases is consistent with being fat-tailed, implying that large superspreading events are extremal, yet probable, occurrences. We integrate these results with interaction-based network models of disease transmission and show that superspreading, when it is fat-tailed, leads to pronounced transmission by increasing dispersion. Our findings indicate that large superspreading events should be the targets of interventions that minimize tail exposure.
ISSN:0027-8424
1091-6490
DOI:10.1073/pnas.2018490117