Can quarantine do more than just “flatten the curve”? (Vol. 52, No. 1)

Our modeling of the epidemic shows that compared to a single-phase soft quarantine, a quarantine composed of a strict phase followed by a softer one results in a smaller overall number of infected individuals. This occurs if individuals with anomalously-many connections such as essential workers or store cashiers become immune before all others are allowed to come out of the strict quarantine. In this case, the most “socially connected” individuals, once recovered, act as efficient breaks in the network of disease transmission.

V. Nimmagadda, O. Kogan and E. Khain, Path-dependent course of epidemic: Are two phases of quarantine better than one?', EPL 132 (2020)
[Abstract]