A new estimation method for COVID-19 time-varying reproduction number using active cases

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Abstract

We propose a new method to estimate the time-varying effective (or instantaneous) reproduction number of the novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19). The method is based on a discrete-time stochastic augmented compartmental model that describes the virus transmission. A two-stage estimation method, which combines the Extended Kalman Filter (EKF) to estimate the reported state variables (active and removed cases) and a low pass filter based on a rational transfer function to remove short term fluctuations of the reported cases, is used with case uncertainties that are assumed to follow a Gaussian distribution. Our method does not require information regarding serial intervals, which makes the estimation procedure simpler without reducing the quality of the estimate. We show that the proposed method is comparable to common approaches, e.g., age-structured and new cases based sequential Bayesian models. We also apply it to COVID-19 cases in the Scandinavian countries: Denmark, Sweden, and Norway, where the positive rates were below 5% recommended by WHO.

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  1. SciScore for 10.1101/2020.06.28.20142158: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board Statementnot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.


    Results from OddPub: Thank you for sharing your code and data.


    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    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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