Measuring COVID-19 spreading speed through the mean time between infections indicator

Abstract

Abstract Objectives To introduce a novel way of measuring the spreading speed of an epidemic. Methods We propose to use the mean time between infections (MTBI) metric obtained from a recently introduced nonhomogeneous Markov stochastic model. Different types of parameter calibration are performed. We estimate the MTBI using data from different time windows and from the whole stage history and compare the results. In order to detect waves and stages in the input data, a preprocessing filtering technique is applied. Results The results of applying this indicator to the COVID-19 reported data of infections from Argentina, Germany and the United States are shown. We find that the MTBI behaves similarly with respect to the different data inputs, whereas the model parameters completely change their behaviour. Evolution over time of the parameters and the MTBI indicator is also shown. Conclusions We show evidence to support the claim that the MTBI is a rather good indicator in order to measure the spreading speed of an epidemic, having similar values whatever the input data size.