Quantitative Identification Study of Epidemic Risk in the Spatial Environment of Harbin City

Abstract

Global pandemics pose a threat to the sustainable development of urban health. As urban spaces are important places for people to interact, overcrowding in these spaces can increase the risk of disease transmission, which is detrimental to the sustainable development of urban health. Therefore, it is crucial to identify potential epidemic risk areas and assess their risk levels for future epidemic prevention and the sustainable development of urban health. This article takes the main urban area of Harbin as the research object and conducts a cluster spatial analysis from multiple perspectives, including building density, functional density, functional mix, proximity, intermediacy, and thermal intensity, proposing a comprehensive identification method. The study found that (1) functional density is the most significant influencing factor in the formation of epidemic risks. Among various urban functions, commercial and public service functions have the strongest impact on the generation and spread of epidemic risks, and their distribution also has the widest impact range. (2) The spaces with higher levels of epidemic risk in Harbin are mainly distributed in the core urban areas, while the peripheral areas have relatively lower levels of risk, showing a decreasing trend from the center to the periphery. At the same time, the hierarchical distribution of urban space also has an impact on the spatial distribution of the epidemic. (3) The method proposed in this study played an important role in identifying the spatial aggregation of epidemic risks in Harbin and successfully identified the risk levels of epidemic distribution in the city. In spatial terms, it is consistent with high-risk locations of epidemic outbreaks, which proves the effectiveness and feasibility of the proposed method. These research findings are beneficial for measures to promote sustainable urban development, improve the city’s epidemic prevention capabilities and public health levels, and make greater contributions to the sustainable development of global public health, promoting global health endeavors.