County-Level Factors That Influenced the Trajectory of COVID-19 Incidence in the New York City Area.

Ashley Wendell Kranjac,Dinko Kranjac

doi:10.1089/hs.2020.0236

Abstract

More than a century of research has shown that sociodemographic conditions affect infectious disease transmission. In the late spring and early summer of 2020, reports of the effects of sociodemographic variables on the spread of COVID-19 were used in the media with minimal scientific proof attached. With new cases of COVID-19 surging in the United States at that time, it became essential to better understand how the spread of COVID-19 was varying across all segments of the population. We used hierarchical exponential growth curve modeling techniques to examine whether community socioeconomic characteristics uniquely influence the incidence of reported COVID-19 cases in the urban built environment. We show that as of July 19, 2020, confirmed coronavirus infections in New York City and surrounding areas—one of the early epicenters of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States—were concentrated along demographic and socioeconomic lines. Furthermore, our data provides evidence that after the onset of the pandemic, timely enactment of physical distancing measures such as school closures was essential to limiting the extent of the coronavirus spread in the population. We conclude that in a pandemic, public health authorities must impose physical distancing measures early on as well as consider community-level factors that associate with a greater risk of viral transmission.

Highlights

The presence of SARS-CoV-2 was initially detected in Wuhan, China, in December 2019.1 Since the outbreak of COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, has spread worldwide.[2]
We observed a substantial increase in the daily number of diagnoses along with evidence that earlier enactment of physical distancing control policies, here measured by K-12 school closure dates,[17,18] likely altered the trajectory of the outbreak
This latter finding clearly underscores the importance of timely introduction of physical distancing measures to prevent virus diffusion, when used in combination and enacted without delay, as reported elsewhere.[22]

Summary

Introduction

The presence of SARS-CoV-2 was initially detected in Wuhan, China, in December 2019.1 Since the outbreak of COVID-19, the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2, has spread worldwide.[2] As of July 19, 2020, the United States found itself atop the list of countries most heavily impacted by the pandemic, in terms of both total diagnoses and total fatalities.[3] Within the United States, the residents of the state of New York were, until mid-May of 2020, disproportionately affected by COVID-19, with New York City accounting for the vast majority of cases and deaths in the country.[4]. Following the first confirmed New York case in March. 2020, the incidence of COVID-19 in and around New York City followed an alarming exponential rise.[4] This. Ashley Wendell Kranjac, PhD, is an Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, Chapman University, Orange, CA. Dinko Kranjac, PhD, is an Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, University of La Verne, La Verne, CA.

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