Dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 with waning immunity in the UK population
This article has been Reviewed by the following groups
Listed in
- Evaluated articles (ScreenIT)
Abstract
The dynamics of immunity are crucial to understanding the long-term patterns of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic. Several cases of reinfection with SARS-CoV-2 have been documented 48–142 days after the initial infection and immunity to seasonal circulating coronaviruses is estimated to be shorter than 1 year. Using an age-structured, deterministic model, we explore potential immunity dynamics using contact data from the UK population. In the scenario where immunity to SARS-CoV-2 lasts an average of three months for non-hospitalized individuals, a year for hospitalized individuals, and the effective reproduction number after lockdown ends is 1.2 (our worst-case scenario), we find that the secondary peak occurs in winter 2020 with a daily maximum of 387 000 infectious individuals and 125 000 daily new cases; threefold greater than in a scenario with permanent immunity. Our models suggest that longitudinal serological surveys to determine if immunity in the population is waning will be most informative when sampling takes place from the end of the lockdown in June until autumn 2020. After this period, the proportion of the population with antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 is expected to increase due to the secondary wave. Overall, our analysis presents considerations for policy makers on the longer-term dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 in the UK and suggests that strategies designed to achieve herd immunity may lead to repeated waves of infection as immunity to reinfection is not permanent.
This article is part of the theme issue ‘Modelling that shaped the early COVID-19 pandemic response in the UK’.
Article activity feed
-
-
SciScore for 10.1101/2020.07.24.20157982: (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: Thank you for sharing your code.
Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:In addition to the limitations listed above, the epidemic trajectory will be substantially altered by any future interventions such as a return to full lockdown conditions, or intensive contact tracing and isolation [29, 68]. We emphasise that the average duration of immunity following recovery impacts substantially on epidemic growth following the easing of non-pharmaceutical interventions, and that slight differences in Rt above or below one …
SciScore for 10.1101/2020.07.24.20157982: (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: Thank you for sharing your code.
Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:In addition to the limitations listed above, the epidemic trajectory will be substantially altered by any future interventions such as a return to full lockdown conditions, or intensive contact tracing and isolation [29, 68]. We emphasise that the average duration of immunity following recovery impacts substantially on epidemic growth following the easing of non-pharmaceutical interventions, and that slight differences in Rt above or below one can lead to qualitatively different infection dynamics.
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.
-
