Impact of Social Distancing Measures on COVID-19 Healthcare Demand in Central Texas

Xutong Wang; Remy F Pasco; Zhanwei Du; Michaela Petty; Spencer J Fox; Alison P Galvani; Michael Pignone; S. Claiborne Johnston; Lauren Ancel Meyers

We assumed a basic reproduction number ( R 0 ) of 2.2 [23] and considered two different doubling times of 7.2 days (low growth rate) [23] [24] [25] [26] and 4 days (high growth rate) [25, 27, 28] . Age-specific contact rates were estimated using contact matrices published by Prem et al. and are adjusted to model school closures and various levels of social distancing [29] . Transmission rates were estimated by fitting simulations to a given R 0 and epidemic doubling time. The incubation period was sampled from a triangular distribution from 5.6 days to 8.2 days with mean of 7 days [30] and the infectious period was sampled from a triangular distribution from 21.1 days to 24.4 days with mean of 22.6 days [31] . We assumed the asymptomatic ratio to be 17.9% [32] with 12.6% of infections arising from pre-symptomatic transmission during the incubation period [22] .