Validity of Air Quality as a Measure of Human Mobility in Uganda. The COVID-19 Context
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Date
2022
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Research Square
Abstract
Mobility patterns are valuable in identifying transmission patterns for infectious diseases and in deriving
contact matrices that are used to parametrize mathematical models. Aggregated location data from
mobile phones have been the main means of measuring human mobility on a population level. However,
these data come with several limitations related to individual privacy, access and restriction of the GPS
location by the user that limit their use.
Methods
We explored the viability of using ground monitored air quality data as an alternative to aggregated
location data from mobile phones, as a measure of human mobility in two cities in Uganda. We
determined associations between air quality and human mobility; and the effect of mobility restrictions
on mobility and air quality using Pearson correlation (R), multivariate regression and visualized these
relationships using scatter plots.
Results
Daily mean levels for PM2.5 in both cities were consistently higher than the WHO guideline limit, with a
mean of 77.0μg/m3 (Range = 22.0–309) for Kampala and 60.0μg/m3 (Range = 18.2–331) for Wakiso.
PM10 levels had a mean of 84.6μg/m3 (Range = 25.0–318) in Kampala and 67.9μg/m3 (Range = 21.0–
340) in Wakiso. PM2.5 was negatively correlated with the government response stringency index for
Kampala (R = -0.31, p < 0.001) and Wakiso (R = -0.21, p < 0.001). In Kampala, PM2.5 was positively
associated with movement in grocery and pharmacy (R = 0.24, p < 0.001), parks (R = 0.25, p < 0.001), retail
and recreation (R = 0.24, p < 0.001), transit stations (R = 0.3, p < 0.001) and work places (R = 0.2, p < 0.001);
and negatively correlated with movement in residential places (R = -0.3, p < 0.001). Only associations
between PM2.5 and movement in workplaces and residential places were statistically significant in
Wakiso (R = 0.14, p < 0.001 and R = -0.19, p = 0.003 respectively).
Conclusions
These findings suggest that air quality data are linked to human mobility data and could thus be used to
monitor human movement patterns. This work represents a pioneer study to empirically and
quantitatively assess the value of air quality data as a surrogate for human mobility in Uganda.
Description
Keywords
Air quality, Human mobility, Transmission, Infectious diseases, Particulate matter
Citation
Galiwango, R., Bainomugisha, E., Kivunike, F., Kateete, D. P., & Jjingo, D. (2022). Validity of Air Quality as a Measure of Human Mobility in Uganda. The COVID-19 Context. https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-1485394/v1