Hot or cold weather may not significantly affect the spread of Covid-19: Study

This study suggests that the transmission of Covid-19 from one person to another is almost entirely dependent on human behavior, regardless of heat or cold. (Exprss photo by Amit Mehra / File)

Temperature and humidity do not play an important role in the spread of the novel Coronavirus, That’s the cause COVID-19According to a study led by a researcher from India in the United States.

This study, published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, suggests that the transmission of Covid-19 from one person to another is almost entirely dependent on human behavior, regardless of heat or cold. doing.

Researchers have pointed out that the weather affects the environment in which the coronavirus must survive before it can infect new hosts.

However, they also affect human behavior, transferring the virus from one host to another, they said.

“Weather has less impact, and other features such as mobility have more impact than weather. Weather is one of the last parameters in terms of relative importance,” said the University of Texas at Austin (UT). ) Professor Dev Niyogi, who led the research, said.

In this study, the weather was defined as “equivalent temperature”. It combines temperature and humidity into a single value.

Scientists then analyzed how this coronavirus-tracked value spread to different regions on a scale from the United States between March and July 2020. States, counties, countries, regions, and the entire world.

On a county and state scale, researchers also used cell phone data to study travel habits and investigated the relationship between coronavirus infection and human behavior.

This study investigated human behavior in a general sense and did not attempt to link it to how the weather affected it.

At each scale, researchers adjusted the analysis so that population differences did not distort the results. Beyond scale, scientists have found that the weather has little effect.

Researchers compared the weather to other factors using statistical indicators that analyze the relative contribution of each factor to a particular result.

They found that the relative importance of weather on a county scale was less than 3%, indicating that one type of weather promoted was spreading to another.

In contrast, according to researchers, the data showed a clear impact on human behavior, as well as a significant impact on individual behavior.

Going on a trip and staying away from home are the top two factors contributing to Covid-19’s growth, with relative importance of about 34% and 26%, respectively, they said.

Researchers pointed out that two important factors are population and urban density, which are of relative importance of about 23 percent and 13 percent, respectively.

“We should not consider this problem to be caused by weather or climate. We need to take personal precautions and be aware of the factors of exposure to the city,” the study said. Says Sajad Jamshidi, a research assistant at Purdue University in the United States, who co-authored.

Maryam Baniasad, a doctoral candidate at The Ohio State University in the United States, said that assumptions about how the coronavirus responds to the weather are largely informed by laboratory studies of related viruses. Said.

Baniasad said the study demonstrates the importance of studies analyzing how the coronavirus spreads throughout the human community.

“When studying something in the lab, it’s a monitored environment. It’s hard to scale up to society. This was the first motivation for doing more extensive research,” she added.

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