1. Despite vaccination, China needs non-pharmaceutical interventions to prevent widespread outbreaks of COVID-19 in 2021
- Author
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Juan Yang, Stefano Merler, Qianhui Wu, Zeyao Zhao, Jun Cai, Hongjie Yu, Guangjie Zhong, Filippo Trentini, Wei Wang, Juanjuan Zhang, Marco Ajelli, Wen Zheng, Piero Poletti, Giorgio Guzzetta, Kaige Dong, Valentina Marziano, Cécile Viboud, and Xiaowei Deng
- Subjects
China ,COVID-19 Vaccines ,Social Psychology ,Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) ,Epidemiology ,Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) ,Population ,Psychological intervention ,Experimental and Cognitive Psychology ,VACCINATION, MODELING, COVID-19, CHINA ,Article ,law.invention ,Disease Outbreaks ,03 medical and health sciences ,Behavioral Neuroscience ,COVID-19, COVID-19 VACCINES, CHINA, DISEASE OUTBREAKS, HUMANS, VACCINATION ,0302 clinical medicine ,MODELING ,law ,Environmental health ,Humans ,030212 general & internal medicine ,education ,030304 developmental biology ,0303 health sciences ,education.field_of_study ,Vaccination ,Outbreak ,COVID-19 ,Transmission (mechanics) ,Infectious diseases ,Business - Abstract
COVID-19 vaccination is being conducted in over 200 countries and regions to control SARS-CoV-2 transmission and return to a pre-pandemic lifestyle. However, understanding when non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) can be lifted as immunity builds up remains a key question for policy makers. To address this, we built a data-driven model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission for China. We estimated that, to prevent the escalation of local outbreaks to widespread epidemics, stringent NPIs need to remain in place at least one year after the start of vaccination. Should NPIs alone be capable of keeping the reproduction number (Rt) around 1.3, the synergetic effect of NPIs and vaccination could reduce the COVID-19 burden by up to 99% and bring Rt below the epidemic threshold in about 9 months. Maintaining strict NPIs throughout 2021 is of paramount importance to reduce COVID-19 burden while vaccines are distributed to the population, especially in large populations with little natural immunity., Using data-driven epidemiological modelling, Yu et al. estimate that, even with increasing vaccine availability, China will have to maintain stringent non-pharmaceutical interventions for at least a year to prevent new widespread outbreaks of COVID-19.
- Published
- 2021