Journal article
Rapid antigen testing as a reactive response to surges in nosocomial SARS-CoV-2 outbreak risk
- Abstract:
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Healthcare facilities are vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 introductions and subsequent nosocomial outbreaks. Antigen rapid diagnostic testing (Ag-RDT) is widely used for population screening, but its health and economic benefits as a reactive response to local surges in outbreak risk are unclear. We simulate SARS-CoV-2 transmission in a long-term care hospital with varying COVID-19 containment measures in place (social distancing, face masks, vaccination). Across scenarios, nosocomial incidence is reduced by up to 40-47% (range of means) with routine symptomatic RT-PCR testing, 59-63% with the addition of a timely round of Ag-RDT screening, and 69-75% with well-timed two-round screening. For the latter, a delay of 4-5 days between the two screening rounds is optimal for transmission prevention. Screening efficacy varies depending on test sensitivity, test type, subpopulations targeted, and community incidence. Efficiency, however, varies primarily depending on underlying outbreak risk, with health-economic benefits scaling by orders of magnitude depending on the COVID-19 containment measures in place.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 1.9MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1038/s41467-021-27845-w
Authors
- Publisher:
- Springer Nature
- Journal:
- Nature Communications More from this journal
- Volume:
- 13
- Issue:
- 1
- Article number:
- 236
- Publication date:
- 2022-01-11
- Acceptance date:
- 2021-12-07
- DOI:
- EISSN:
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2041-1723
- Pmid:
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35017499
- Language:
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English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
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1331745
- Local pid:
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pubs:1331745
- Deposit date:
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2023-03-27
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Smith et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2022
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2022. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons license and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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