Was R < 1 before the English lockdowns? On modelling mechanistic detail, causality and inference about Covid-19.

ABSTRACT: Detail is a double edged sword in epidemiological modelling. The inclusion of mechanistic detail in models of highly complex systems has the potential to increase realism, but it also increases the number of modelling assumptions, which become harder to check as their possible interactions multiply. In a major study of the Covid-19 epidemic in England, Knock et al. (2020) fit an age structured SEIR model with added health service compartments to data on deaths, hospitalization and test results from Covid-19 in seven English regions for the period March to December 2020. The simplest version of the model has 684 states per region. One main conclusion is that only full lockdowns brought the pathogen reproduction number, R, below one, with R ≫ 1 in all regions on the eve of March 2020 lockdow

SUBMITTER: Wood SN 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8457481 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature