The effects of physical distancing and lockdown to restrain SARS-CoV-2 outbreak in the Italian Municipality of Cogne

  1. F. Truc
  2. G. Gervino

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Abstract

The outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 started in Wuhan, China, and is now a pandemic. An understanding of the prevalence and contagiousness of the disease, and of whether the strategies used to contain it to date have been successful, is important for understanding future containment strategies. One strategy for controlling the spread of SARS-CoV-2 is to adopt strong social distancing policies. The Municipality of Cogne (I), adopted strict lockdown rules from March 4, 2020 up to May 18, 2020. This first wave of the pandemic impressed by the extremely low impact of the SARS-CoV-2 on the locals, compared to the number accused on all the Italian territory. Starting from October 2020 up to the end of December, when the second wave hit Italy and Cogne territory, heavier effects were observed. In order to cast light on the effectiveness of the adopted strategy 74,5% of the local population underwent to a blood screening to detect IgM and IgG antibodies and after six months all the people tested positive were again investigated to establish the longitudinal changes in antibodies level. Moreover, within the context of this survey a rare and interesting case of secondary infection has been identified and here presented.

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.03.19.21253962: (What is this?)

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

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board StatementConsent: All study participants provided written informed consent.
    IRB: The study was approved by the Ethics Committee of Aosta Valley (I).
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Antibodies
    SentencesResources
    2.1 Sample collection: Cogne’s residents, on 4 and 5 June 2020 were invited by the municipal authority to donate a blood sample for subsequent laboratory test to detect antibodies against SARS-CoV-2.
    SARS-CoV-2
    suggested: None
    On December 15, 2020 (second time-point) Cogne’s Municipality invited people tested positive for IgM and/or IgG [2],[3] to the second blood test, to assess the longitudinal changes in antibodies level within 6 months after the first sample collection.
    IgG [2],[3
    suggested: None
    2.2 Antibody measurement: The serological test was a chemiluminescent micro-particle immunoassay (YHLO iFlash; Pantec s.r.l.) for quantitative detection of IgG (C86095G) and IgM (C86095M) against SARS-CoV-2 Nucleoprotein (N) and Spike glycoprotein (S) [4].
    IgM (C86095M) against SARS-CoV-2 Nucleoprotein (N) and Spike glycoprotein (S)
    suggested: None

    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: 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.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.03.19.21253962v1 on medRxiv
  3. Version published to 10.26502/aimr.0079