High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing
<br><strong>Background<br></strong> Understanding changes in infectiousness during SARS-COV-2 infections is critical to assess the effectiveness of public health measures such as contact tracing. <br><strong>Methods<br></strong> Here, we develop a nove...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Journal article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
eLife Sciences Publications
2021
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| _version_ | 1797052198643826688 |
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| author | Hart, W Maini, P Thompson, R |
| author_facet | Hart, W Maini, P Thompson, R |
| author_sort | Hart, W |
| collection | OXFORD |
| description | <br><strong>Background<br></strong>
Understanding changes in infectiousness during SARS-COV-2 infections is critical to assess the effectiveness of public health measures such as contact tracing.
<br><strong>Methods<br></strong>
Here, we develop a novel mechanistic approach to infer the infectiousness profile of SARS17 COV-2 infected individuals using data from known infector-infectee pairs. We compare estimates of key epidemiological quantities generated using our mechanistic method with analogous estimates generated using previous approaches.
<br><strong>Results<br></strong>
The mechanistic method provides an improved fit to data from SARS-CoV-2 infector infectee pairs compared to commonly used approaches. Our best-fitting model indicates a high proportion of presymptomatic transmissions, with many transmissions occurring shortly before the infector develops symptoms.
<br><strong>Conclusions<br></strong>
High infectiousness immediately prior to symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing until effective vaccines have been distributed widely, even if contacts from a short time window before symptom onset alone are traced.
<br><strong>Funding<br></strong>
Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-06T18:29:06Z |
| format | Journal article |
| id | oxford-uuid:090303fc-7f27-4abf-90a8-a208d70ca5e8 |
| institution | University of Oxford |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-06T18:29:06Z |
| publishDate | 2021 |
| publisher | eLife Sciences Publications |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | oxford-uuid:090303fc-7f27-4abf-90a8-a208d70ca5e82022-03-26T09:15:58ZHigh infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracingJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:090303fc-7f27-4abf-90a8-a208d70ca5e8EnglishSymplectic ElementseLife Sciences Publications2021Hart, WMaini, PThompson, R<br><strong>Background<br></strong> Understanding changes in infectiousness during SARS-COV-2 infections is critical to assess the effectiveness of public health measures such as contact tracing. <br><strong>Methods<br></strong> Here, we develop a novel mechanistic approach to infer the infectiousness profile of SARS17 COV-2 infected individuals using data from known infector-infectee pairs. We compare estimates of key epidemiological quantities generated using our mechanistic method with analogous estimates generated using previous approaches. <br><strong>Results<br></strong> The mechanistic method provides an improved fit to data from SARS-CoV-2 infector infectee pairs compared to commonly used approaches. Our best-fitting model indicates a high proportion of presymptomatic transmissions, with many transmissions occurring shortly before the infector develops symptoms. <br><strong>Conclusions<br></strong> High infectiousness immediately prior to symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing until effective vaccines have been distributed widely, even if contacts from a short time window before symptom onset alone are traced. <br><strong>Funding<br></strong> Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). |
| spellingShingle | Hart, W Maini, P Thompson, R High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title | High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title_full | High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title_fullStr | High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title_full_unstemmed | High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title_short | High infectiousness immediately before COVID-19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
| title_sort | high infectiousness immediately before covid 19 symptom onset highlights the importance of continued contact tracing |
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