Simulation analysis of immunization policy diffusion in social network with ABM approach

Abstract

Immunization policy strives to promote vaccination coverage in population-wide social network of community by encouraging vaccination for a group of vulnerable population and accelerating health awareness diffusion in the personal networks of vaccinators. In order to determine the relative prognostic importance of the various factors predisposing to vaccination decision-making of individual and analyze diffusion of innovation in immunization policy adoption on overall social network architecture, this paper carries out an agent-based modeling (ABM) approach to construct a pandemic immunization simulation model for providing insights into immunization behavior modification of individual during social interaction in community. Simulation results give decision support to assess the relative impact of healthcare services for pandemic control and suggest that reasonable immunization policies tend to promote individual immunization behavior. Moreover, propagation path of immunization awareness inside the community can be reviewed in depth in the simulation result.