Comparing the incidence of SARS-CoV-2 across age groups considering sampling biases - use of testing data of autumn 2021 in Belgium.
Arch Public Health
; 81(1): 66, 2023 Apr 23.
Article
em En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-37088854
ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND:
To design efficient mitigation measures against COVID-19, understanding the transmission dynamics between different age groups was crucial. The role of children in the pandemic has been intensely debated and involves both scientific and ethical questions. To design efficient age-targeted non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPI), a good view of the incidence of the different age groups was needed. However, using Belgian testing data to infer real incidence (RI) from observed incidence (OI) or positivity ratio (PR) was not trivial.METHODS:
Based on Belgian testing data collected during the Delta wave of Autumn 2021, we compared the use of different estimators of RI and analyzed their effect on comparisons between age groups.RESULTS:
We found that the RI estimator's choice strongly influences the comparison between age groups.CONCLUSION:
The widespread implementation of testing campaigns using representative population samples could help to avoid pitfalls related to the current testing strategy in Belgium and worldwide. This approach would also allow a better comparison of the data from different countries while reducing biases arising from the specificities of each surveillance system.
Texto completo:
1
Coleções:
01-internacional
Base de dados:
MEDLINE
Tipo de estudo:
Incidence_studies
/
Risk_factors_studies
Aspecto:
Ethics
Idioma:
En
Revista:
Arch Public Health
Ano de publicação:
2023
Tipo de documento:
Article