Two mechanisms for accelerated diffusion of COVID-19 outbreaks in regions with high intensity of population and polluting industrialization: the air pollution-to-human and human-to-human transmission dynamics

Mario Coccia

At the end of 2019, medical professionals in Wuhan (China) were treating cases of pneumonia cases that had an unknown source Zhu and Xie, 2020; Chan et al., 2020; Backer et al., 2020) . Days later, researchers confirmed the illnesses were caused by a new coronavirus . By January 23, 2020, Chinese authorities had shut down transportation going into and out of Wuhan, as well as local businesses, in order to reduce the spread of viral infectivity (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 2020; Public Health England. 2020; Manuell and Cukor, 2011) . It was the first in the modern history of several quarantines set up in China and other countries around the world to cope with transmission dynamics of COVID-19. Quarantine is the separation and restriction of movement of people who have potentially been exposed to a contagious disease to ascertain if they become unwell, in order to reduce the risk of them infecting others (Brooks et al., 2019) . In short, quarantine can generate a strong reduction of the transmission of viral infectivity. In the presence of COVID-19 outbreak in North Italy, Italian government has applied the quarantine and lockdown from 11 March, 2020 to 13 April, 2020 for all Italy, adding also some holidays thereafter. In fact, Italy was not able to prevent this complex problem of epidemics and has applied quarantine as a recovery strategy to lessen the health and socioeconomic damages caused by COVID-19.