Infections which share the same route of transmission may also have the same highly connected individuals. Knowing which individuals have many contacts (whereby a "contact" depends on the mode of transmission of an infectious agent) may help public health agencies to control whole groups of infectious diseases, including newly emerging ones, rather than individual diseases. In specific settings, highly connected individuals may be identified using other approaches: in hospitals and companies, an analysis of the team structure and its meeting schedules can hint at who has most contacts. This may also affect the focus of business continuity plans, written to prepare for pandemic influenza or similar events. Simulation studies show that highly connected individuals are reached rather early by newly introduced infections. Thus, the knowledge of such people can also be used to improve outbreak detection [17] .