Inferring the effective start dates of non-pharmaceutical interventions during COVID-19 outbreaks.

ABSTRACT:

Background

During Feb-Apr. 2020, many countries implemented non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), such as school closures and lockdowns, to control the COVID-19 pandemic caused by the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Overall, these interventions seem to have reduced the spread of the pandemic. We hypothesized that the official and effective start dates of NPIs can be noticeably different, for example, due to slow adoption by the population, and that these differences can lead to errors in the estimation of the impact of NPIs.

Methods

SEIR models were fitted to case data from 12 regions to infer the effective start dates of interventions and compare these with the official dates. The impact of NPIs was estimated from the inferred model parameters.

Results

We infer mostly late effe

SUBMITTER: Kohanovski I 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8720386 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature