In:
Epidemiology, Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health), Vol. 32, No. 1 ( 2021-01), p. 79-86
Abstract:
We hypothesize that comprehensive surveillance of COVID-19 in Singapore has facilitated early case detection and prompt contact tracing and, with community-based measures, contained spread. We assessed the effectiveness of containment measures by estimating transmissibility (effective reproduction number, JOURNAL/epide/04.03/00001648-202101000-00011/inline-graphic1/v/2023-09-08T094005Z/r/image-tiff ) over the course of the outbreak. Methods: We used a Bayesian data augmentation framework to allocate infectors to infectees with no known infectors and determine serial interval distribution parameters via Markov chain Monte Carlo sampling. We fitted a smoothing spline to the number of secondary cases generated by each infector by respective onset dates to estimate JOURNAL/epide/04.03/00001648-202101000-00011/inline-graphic2/v/2023-09-08T094005Z/r/image-tiff and evaluated increase in mean number of secondary cases per individual for each day’s delay in starting isolation or quarantine. Results: As of April 1, 2020, 1000 COVID-19 cases were reported in Singapore. We estimated a mean serial interval of 4.6 days [95% credible interval (CI) = 4.2, 5.1] with a SD of 3.5 days (95% CI = 3.1, 4.0). The posterior mean JOURNAL/epide/04.03/00001648-202101000-00011/inline-graphic3/v/2023-09-08T094005Z/r/image-tiff was below one for most of the time, peaking at 1.1 (95% CI = 1.0, 1.3) on week 9 of 2020 due to a spreading event in one of the clusters. Eight hundred twenty-seven (82.7%) of cases infected less than one person on average. Over an interval of 7 days, the incremental mean number of cases generated per individual for each day’s delay in starting isolation or quarantine was 0.03 cases (95% CI = 0.02, 0.05). Conclusions: We estimate that robust surveillance, active case detection, prompt contact tracing, and quarantine of close contacts kept JOURNAL/epide/04.03/00001648-202101000-00011/inline-graphic4/v/2023-09-08T094005Z/r/image-tiff below one.
Type of Medium:
Online Resource
ISSN:
1044-3983
DOI:
10.1097/EDE.0000000000001257
Language:
English
Publisher:
Ovid Technologies (Wolters Kluwer Health)
Publication Date:
2021
detail.hit.zdb_id:
2042095-X
