Who got tested and who got sick? Sociodemographic inequalities in COVID-19 testing and hospitalization among 1.48 million individuals in Sweden.

ABSTRACT: In the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic, PCR testing served different purposes for individuals and for policy makers. Policy makers relied on testing for representative case numbers to track and mitigate the spread of the disease whereas individuals needed tests to protect themselves and others, or to travel or go work. Systematic differences in testing across population groups can bias case numbers, making it more difficult for policy makers to implement effective non-pharmaceutical interventions. We link records of 494 699 PCR-tests taken between 2020-07-01 and 2020-12-31 to individual records in several administrative registers for 1 480 126 working age individuals in the counties of Stockholm and Scania in Sweden. We estimate the likelihood of getting tested, test positivity rate

SUBMITTER: Ostergren OM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC12756271 | biostudies-literature | 2025 Dec

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature