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The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements

Controlling the spread of influenza to reduce the effects of infection on a population is an important mandate of public health. Mass media reports on an epidemic or pandemic can provide important information to the public, and in turn, can induce positive healthy behaviour practices (i.e., handwash...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Collinson, Shannon, Khan, Kamran, Heffernan, Jane M.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Public Library of Science 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4631512/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26528909
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0141423
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author Collinson, Shannon
Khan, Kamran
Heffernan, Jane M.
author_facet Collinson, Shannon
Khan, Kamran
Heffernan, Jane M.
author_sort Collinson, Shannon
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description Controlling the spread of influenza to reduce the effects of infection on a population is an important mandate of public health. Mass media reports on an epidemic or pandemic can provide important information to the public, and in turn, can induce positive healthy behaviour practices (i.e., handwashing, social distancing) in the individuals, that will reduce the probability of contracting the disease. Mass media fatigue, however, can dampen these effects. Mathematical models can be used to study the effects of mass media reports on epidemic/pandemic outcomes. In this study we employ a stochastic agent based model to provide a quantification of mass media reports on the variability in important public health measurements. We also include mass media report data compiled by the Global Public Health Intelligence Network, to study the effects of mass media reports in the 2009 H1N1 pandemic. We find that the report rate and the rate at which individuals relax their healthy behaviours (media fatigue) greatly affect the variability in important public health measurements. When the mass media reporting data is included in the model, two peaks of infection result.
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spelling pubmed-46315122015-11-13 The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements Collinson, Shannon Khan, Kamran Heffernan, Jane M. PLoS One Research Article Controlling the spread of influenza to reduce the effects of infection on a population is an important mandate of public health. Mass media reports on an epidemic or pandemic can provide important information to the public, and in turn, can induce positive healthy behaviour practices (i.e., handwashing, social distancing) in the individuals, that will reduce the probability of contracting the disease. Mass media fatigue, however, can dampen these effects. Mathematical models can be used to study the effects of mass media reports on epidemic/pandemic outcomes. In this study we employ a stochastic agent based model to provide a quantification of mass media reports on the variability in important public health measurements. We also include mass media report data compiled by the Global Public Health Intelligence Network, to study the effects of mass media reports in the 2009 H1N1 pandemic. We find that the report rate and the rate at which individuals relax their healthy behaviours (media fatigue) greatly affect the variability in important public health measurements. When the mass media reporting data is included in the model, two peaks of infection result. Public Library of Science 2015-11-03 /pmc/articles/PMC4631512/ /pubmed/26528909 http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0141423 Text en © 2015 Collinson et al http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are properly credited.
spellingShingle Research Article
Collinson, Shannon
Khan, Kamran
Heffernan, Jane M.
The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title_full The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title_fullStr The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title_full_unstemmed The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title_short The Effects of Media Reports on Disease Spread and Important Public Health Measurements
title_sort effects of media reports on disease spread and important public health measurements
topic Research Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4631512/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26528909
http://dx.doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0141423
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