Journal article
Reinfection with SARS-CoV-2: discrete SIR (Susceptible, Infected, Recovered) modeling using empirical infection data
- Abstract:
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BACKGROUND:
The novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, which causes the COVID-19 disease, has resulted in a global pandemic. Since its emergence in December 2019, the virus has infected millions of people, caused the deaths of hundreds of thousands, and resulted in incalculable social and economic damage. Understanding the infectivity and transmission dynamics of the virus is essential to determine how best to reduce mortality while ensuring minimal social restrictions on the lives of the general population. Anecdotal evidence is available, but detailed studies have not yet revealed whether infection with the virus results in immunity.
OBJECTIVE:
The objective of this study was to use mathematical modeling to investigate the reinfection frequency of COVID-19.
METHODS:
We have used the SIR (Susceptible, Infected, Recovered) framework and random processing based on empirical SARS-CoV-2 infection and fatality data from different regions to calculate the number of reinfections that would be expected to occur if no immunity to the disease occurred.
RESULTS:
Our model predicts that cases of reinfection should have been observed by now if primary SARS-CoV-2 infection did not protect individuals from subsequent exposure in the short term; however, no such cases have been documented.
CONCLUSIONS:
This work concludes that infection with SARS-CoV-2 provides short-term immunity to reinfection and therefore offers useful insight for serological testing strategies, lockdown easing, and vaccine development.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, 460.2KB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.2196/21168
Authors
- Publisher:
- JMIR Publications
- Journal:
- JMIR Public Health and Surveillance More from this journal
- Volume:
- 6
- Issue:
- 4
- Article number:
- e21168
- Publication date:
- 2020-11-16
- Acceptance date:
- 2020-09-22
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2369-2960
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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1173604
- Local pid:
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pubs:1173604
- Deposit date:
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2021-05-05
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Andrew McMahon, Nicole C Robb.
- Copyright date:
- 2020
- Rights statement:
- ©2020 Andrew McMahon, Nicole C Robb. Originally published in JMIR Public Health and Surveillance (http://publichealth.jmir.org). This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work, first published in JMIR Public Health and Surveillance, is properly cited. The complete bibliographic information, a link to the original publication on http://publichealth.jmir.org, as well as this copyright and license information must be included.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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