A new scientific system developed by a St. Michael’s Hospital physician, designed to rapidly evaluate the world’s air traffic patterns, accurately predicted how the H1N1 virus would spread around the world.
The findings were recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
St. Michael’s Hospital scientist and infectious disease physician Dr. Kamran Khan and colleagues analyzed the flight itineraries of the more than 2.3 million passengers departing Mexico on commercial flights during the months of March and April to predict the spread of H1N1. The findings show the international destinations of air travelers leaving Mexico were strongly associated with confirmed importations of the H1N1 virus around the world.
“The relationship between air travel and the spread of H1N1 is intuitive,” said Dr. Khan. “However, for the first time, we can quickly integrate information about worldwide air traffic patterns with information about global infectious disease threats. What this means is that cities and countries around the world can now respond to news of a threat earlier and more intelligently than ever before.”
