Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on gastrointestinal infection trends in England, February-July 2020.

ABSTRACT:

Objective

To establish the impact of the first 6 months of the COVID-19 outbreak response on gastrointestinal (GI) infection trends in England.

Design

Retrospective ecological study using routinely collected national and regional surveillance data from seven UK Health Security Agency coordinated laboratory, outbreak and syndromic surveillance systems using key dates of UK governmental policy change to assign phases for comparison between 2020 and historic data.

Results

Decreases in GI illness activity were observed across all surveillance indicators as COVID-19 cases began to peak. Compared with the 5-year average (2015-2019), during the first 6 months of the COVID-19 response, there was a 52% decrease in GI outbreaks reported (1544 vs 3208 (95% CI 2938 to 3478)) and

SUBMITTER: Love NK 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8968111 | biostudies-literature | 2022 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature