Dear Analyst Episode 26: Data visualizations for infectious diseases/ideas during coronavirus (COVID-19)

Given the media attention placed on the coronavirus (COVID-19) in the media the last few weeks, I thought it was important to take a step back and look at the math behind infectious diseases and how diseases spread. I spend the entire episode taking a look at Going Critical, a blog post by Kevin Simler on how diseases and ideas spread from one person to another. While the models Kevin created may not specifically translate into how COVID-10 (or any other infectious disease) spreads, it gives us a good look at how a disease could spread given transmission rates, immunity rates, and more.

The entire posts rests on this concept of nodes, edges, and active/infected nodes:

Kevin extends this concept to show how a disease or idea can spread to other nodes. I really like this visualization of how a disease could spread from the rural areas to the cities (and how fast that disease can spread once it infiltrates the outer rings of a city):