Phase-adjusted estimation of the number of Coronavirus Disease 2019 cases in Wuhan, China
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Abstract
An outbreak of clusters of viral pneumonia due to a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2) happened in Wuhan, Hubei Province in China in December 2019. Since the outbreak, several groups reported estimated R 0 of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) and generated valuable prediction for the early phase of this outbreak. After implementation of strict prevention and control measures in China, new estimation is needed. An infectious disease dynamics SEIR (Susceptible, Exposed, Infectious, and Removed) model was applied to estimate the epidemic trend in Wuhan, China under two assumptions of R t . In the first assumption, R t was assumed to maintain over 1. The estimated number of infections would continue to increase throughout February without any indication of dropping with R t = 1.9, 2.6, or 3.1. The number of infections would reach 11,044, 70,258, and 227,989, respectively, by 29 February 2020. In the second assumption, R t was assumed to gradually decrease at different phases from high level of transmission ( R t = 3.1, 2.6, and 1.9) to below 1 ( R t = 0.9 or 0.5) owing to increasingly implemented public health intervention. Several phases were divided by the dates when various levels of prevention and control measures were taken in effect in Wuhan. The estimated number of infections would reach the peak in late February, which is 58,077–84,520 or 55,869–81,393. Whether or not the peak of the number of infections would occur in February 2020 may be an important index for evaluating the sufficiency of the current measures taken in China. Regardless of the occurrence of the peak, the currently strict measures in Wuhan should be continuously implemented and necessary strict public health measures should be applied in other locations in China with high number of COVID-19 cases, in order to reduce R t to an ideal level and control the infection.
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SciScore for 10.1101/2020.02.18.20024281: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
NIH rigor criteria are not applicable to paper type.Table 2: Resources
No key resources detected.
Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).
Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:Specifically in Wuhan, in the early phase from beginning of December 2019 to 23 January 2020, there was no limitation of population flow and gathering. When the human-to-human transmission was confirmed, an important decision was made to isolate Wuhan from other parts of the country. As a result, since 24 January 2020, all public …
SciScore for 10.1101/2020.02.18.20024281: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
NIH rigor criteria are not applicable to paper type.Table 2: Resources
No key resources detected.
Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).
Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:Specifically in Wuhan, in the early phase from beginning of December 2019 to 23 January 2020, there was no limitation of population flow and gathering. When the human-to-human transmission was confirmed, an important decision was made to isolate Wuhan from other parts of the country. As a result, since 24 January 2020, all public transports from and to Wuhan, as well as public transports and people’s gathering events within Wuhan, were stopped. Since 2 February 2020, strict public health measures were taken to prevent population flow among distinct communities whereas since 9 February 2020, public health interventions including quarantine of each building in the urban area and each village in the rural area were implemented in order to block the transmission chain among the household. Therefore, strong efforts of authorities and people in Wuhan with the support of the central government and people from all over China, as well as the WHO and the international society, may have gradually braked COVID-19 outbreak. Rt is therefore assumed to decrease gradually from 3.1 to 0.5 in Wuhan, China in the current study. The trend of the estimated cases is in accordance with the trend of currently confirmed cases. The relatively big difference in number may be due to the possible existence of a large number of mild and asymptomatic cases and the imperfection of current diagnostic measures. According to NHC, before 12 February 2020, the confirmed cases were diagnosed according to contact ...
Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.
Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.
Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.
Results from rtransparent:- Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
- No protocol registration statement was detected.
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