An image from the RAND model shows sources of COVID-19 risk for the United States
Prototype Model Visualizes Risk Associated with Air Travel Routes
The COVID-19 Air Traffic Visualization (CAT-V) tool combines case data from Johns Hopkins University with detailed air travel data from the International Air Transport Association. Together, these data sets make it possible to visualize how coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) infections and commercial air travel have interacted to export infection risk across the world. Given air travel data and reported infection rates, our tool can also be used to estimate future patterns of COVID-19 transmission. As a result, policymakers, analysts, and others can estimate the impact of travel-related policy interventions, such as restricting air travel from various countries.
The CAT-V tool offers a "heat map" feature and the ability to visualize the risk associated with individual air travel routes. The tool is currently an internal prototype model being refined for possible public release. We will continue to develop and use the CAT-V tool in new ways, and we will continue to release a stream of derivative findings on topics of interest to policymakers. The first set of findings, below, includes an introduction to the CAT-V tool, an estimate of the rate at which reported cases were being exported from China by the end of January 2020, an estimate of the rate at which cases were being underreported in China that same month, an estimate of the greatest source of importation risk to the United States in late February 2020, and the probable origin of cases in Gulf Cooperation Council countries.
In September 2020, RAND released two new reports describing the spread of COVID-19 before it was declared a pandemic, and the drivers of COVID-19 risk in Africa.
Reports based on the CAT-V tool will be of interest to U.S. Department of Defense policymakers and planners at the strategic and operational levels. At the strategic level, projections of how COVID-19 is likely to propagate across the world can inform defense-related decisions on global deployment pathways and timing, force health protection measures, and emerging risks that competitors may exploit infection patterns for strategic advantage. At the operational level, the projections can inform
The tool and associated reports will also be of interest to U.S. policymakers and planners in other fields, such as foreign policy, public health, transportation, and homeland security.
This research was sponsored by the Office of the Secretary of Defense and the U.S. Air Force and conducted jointly within the Acquisition and Technology Policy Program of the RAND National Security Research Division and the Strategy and Doctrine Program of RAND Project AIR FORCE.
