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Reopening International Borders without Quarantine: Contact Tracing Integrated Policy against COVID-19
- Source :
- International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Volume 18, Issue 14, International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, Vol 18, Iss 7494, p 7494 (2021)
- Publication Year :
- 2021
- Publisher :
- MDPI, 2021.
-
Abstract
- With the COVID-19 vaccination widely implemented in most countries, propelled by the need to revive the tourism economy, there is a growing prospect for relieving the social distancing regulation and reopening borders in tourism-oriented countries and regions. This need incentivizes stakeholders to develop border control strategies that fully evaluate health risks if mandatory quarantines are lifted. In this study, we have employed a computational approach to investigate the contact tracing integrated policy in different border-reopening scenarios in Hong Kong, China. Explicitly, by reconstructing the COVID-19 transmission from historical data, specific scenarios with joint effects of digital contact tracing and other concurrent measures (i.e., controlling arrival population and community nonpharmacological interventions) are applied to forecast the future development of the pandemic. Built on a modified SEIR epidemic model with a 30% vaccination coverage, the results suggest that scenarios with digital contact tracing and quick isolation intervention can reduce the infectious population by 92.11% compared to those without contact tracing. By further restricting the inbound population with a 10,000 daily quota and applying moderate-to-strong community nonpharmacological interventions (NPIs), the average daily confirmed cases in the forecast period of 60 days can be well controlled at around 9 per day (95% CI: 7–12). Two main policy recommendations are drawn from the study. First, digital contact tracing would be an effective countermeasure for reducing local virus spread, especially when it is applied along with a moderate level of vaccination coverage. Second, implementing a daily quota on inbound travelers and restrictive community NPIs would further keep the local infection under control. This study offers scientific evidence and prospective guidance for developing and instituting plans to lift mandatory border control policies in preparing for the global economic recovery.
- Subjects :
- 0301 basic medicine
China
COVID-19 Vaccines
digital contact tracing
Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis
Population
Article
Scientific evidence
03 medical and health sciences
0302 clinical medicine
international travel
Forecast period
Pandemic
Humans
030212 general & internal medicine
Prospective Studies
education
Finance
education.field_of_study
Public economics
business.industry
SARS-CoV-2
Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health
COVID-19
Models, Theoretical
Intervention (law)
030104 developmental biology
Countermeasure
Policy
Economic recovery
Quarantine
Medicine
Hong Kong
border reopening
Business
Contact Tracing
Tourism
Contact tracing
Subjects
Details
- Language :
- English
- ISSN :
- 16604601 and 16617827
- Volume :
- 18
- Issue :
- 14
- Database :
- OpenAIRE
- Journal :
- International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health
- Accession number :
- edsair.doi.dedup.....d095ad992791fca5e25dfda6ba2170b0