Exploring the Relationship among Human Activities, COVID-19 Morbidity, and At-Risk Areas Using Location-Based Social Media Data: Knowledge about the Early Pandemic Stage in Wuhan

Mengyue Yuan, Tong Liu and Chao Yang
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Mengyue Yuan: School of Remote Sensing and Information Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Tong Liu: School of Remote Sensing and Information Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Chao Yang: National Engineering Research Center for Geographic Information System, China University of Geosciences (Wuhan), Wuhan 430079, China

IJERPH, 2022, vol. 19, issue 11, 1-22

Abstract: It is significant to explore the morbidity patterns and at-risk areas of the COVID-19 outbreak in megacities. In this paper, we studied the relationship among human activities, morbidity patterns, and at-risk areas in Wuhan City. First, we excavated the activity patterns from Sina Weibo check-in data during the early COVID-19 pandemic stage (December 2019~January 2020) in Wuhan. We considered human-activity patterns and related demographic information as the COVID-19 influencing determinants, and we used spatial regression models to evaluate the relationships between COVID-19 morbidity and the related factors. Furthermore, we traced Weibo users’ check-in trajectories to characterize the spatial interaction between high-morbidity residential areas and activity venues with POI (point of interest) sites, and we located a series of potential at-risk places in Wuhan. The results provide statistical evidence regarding the utility of human activity and demographic factors for the determination of COVID-19 morbidity patterns in the early pandemic stage in Wuhan. The spatial interaction revealed a general transmission pattern in Wuhan and determined the high-risk areas of COVID-19 transmission. This article explores the human-activity characteristics from social media check-in data and studies how human activities played a role in COVID-19 transmission in Wuhan. From that, we provide new insights for scientific prevention and control of COVID-19.

Keywords: COVID-19 morbidity; human-activity patterns; social media check-ins; spatial analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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