The effects of physical distancing on population mobility during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK

In an attempt to reduce the transmission of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), an estimated 4·5 billion people globally have been placed under some form of lockdown restriction. In the UK, non-essential movement constraints and physical distancing have been in place since March 23, 2020. Modelling and early empirical investigations indicate that physical distancing measures are crucial to reduce transmission of the virus, consequent pressure on health systems, and the number of deaths. For these policies to be successful, adequate compliance must be achieved. To help monitor this compliance, we have developed code to enable us to map national mobility data for the UK, which can also be applied to the data available for 131 other countries and 1167 subregions. The code we used is openly available online.