SARS-CoV-2 has had a greater burden, as measured by rate of infection, in poorer communities within cities. For example, 55% of Mumbai slums residents had antibodies to COVID-19, 3.2 times the seroprevalence in non-slum areas of the city according to a sero-survey done in July 2020. One explanation is that government suppression was less severe in poorer communities, either because the poor were more likely to be exempt or unable to comply. Another explanation is that effective suppression itself accelerated the epidemic in poor neighborhoods because households are more crowded and residents share toilet and water facilities. We show there is little evidence for the first hypothesis in the context of Mumbai. Using location data from smart phones, we find that slum residents had nominally but not significantly (economically or statistically) higher mobility than non-slums prior to the sero-survey. We also find little evidence that mobility in non-slums was lower than in slums during lockdown, a subset of the period before the survey.

按照感染率衡量，SARS-CoV-2 在城市中较贫困的社区中负担更大。例如，根据 2020 年 7 月进行的一项血清学调查，55% 的孟买贫民窟居民具有 COVID-19 抗体，是该市非贫民窟地区血清阳性率的 3.2 倍。一种解释是政府对较贫困地区的镇压力度较小社区，因为穷人更有可能获得豁免或无法遵守。另一种解释是，有效的抑制本身加速了贫困社区的疫情，因为家庭更加拥挤，居民共用厕所和水设施。我们表明，在孟买的背景下，几乎没有证据支持第一个假设。使用来自智能手机的位置数据，我们发现，在血清调查之前，贫民窟居民的流动性名义上但并不显着（经济上或统计上）高于非贫民窟居民。我们还发现几乎没有证据表明在封锁期间非贫民窟的流动性低于贫民窟，这是调查前的一个时期。