The Seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 in Europe: A Systematic Review

  1. Natasha Marcella Vaselli
  2. Daniel Hungerford
  3. Ben Shenton
  4. Arwa Khashkhusha
  5. Nigel A. Cunliffe
  6. Neil French

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Abstract

Background

A year following the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, new infections and deaths continue to increase in Europe. Serological studies, through providing evidence of past infection, can aid understanding of the population dynamics of SARS-CoV-2 infection.

Objectives

This systematic review of SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence studies in Europe was undertaken to inform public health strategies including vaccination, that aim to accelerate population immunity.

Methods

We searched the databases Web of Science, MEDLINE, EMBASE, SCOPUS, Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews and grey literature sources for studies reporting seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in Europe published between 01/12/2019 - 30/09/20. We provide a narrative synthesis of included studies. Studies were categorized into subgroups including healthcare workers (HCWs), community, outbreaks, pregnancy and children/school. Due to heterogeneity in other subgroups, we only performed a random effects meta-analysis of the seroprevalence amongst HCWs stratified by their country.

Results

109 studies were included spanning 17 European countries, that estimated the seroprevalence of SAR-CoV2 from samples obtained between November 2019 – August 2020. A total of 53/109 studies included HCWs with a reported seroprevalence among HCWs ranging from 0.7% to 45.3%, which did not differ significantly by country. In community studies significant heterogeneity was reported in the seroprevalence among different age groups and the majority of studies reported there was no significant difference by gender.

Conclusion

This review demonstrates a wide heterogeneity in reported seroprevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies between populations. Continued evaluation of seroprevalence is required to understand the impact of public health measures and inform interventions including vaccination programmes.

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.04.12.439425: (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

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    We searched the following electronic databases: Web of Science, MEDLINE, EMBASE, SCOPUS and Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews.
    MEDLINE
    suggested: (MEDLINE, RRID:SCR_002185)
    EMBASE
    suggested: (EMBASE, RRID:SCR_001650)
    Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews
    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:
    • No conflict of interest statement was detected. If there are no conflicts, we encourage authors to explicit state so.
    • No funding statement was detected.
    • 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 10.1101/2021.04.12.439425v1 on bioRxiv