Dynamic analysis and evaluation of asymptomatic infection in the spread of COVID-19

  1. Chuanqing Xu
  2. Zonghao Zhang
  3. Xiaotong Huang
  4. Jingan Cui

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Abstract

COVID-19 has spread worldwide for nearly two years. Many countries have experienced repeated epidemics, that is, after the epidemic has been controlled for a period of time, the number of new cases per day is low, and the outbreak will occur again a few months later. In order to study the relationship between this low level of infection and the number of asymptomatic infections, and to evaluate the role of asymptomatic infections in the development of the epidemic, we have established an improved infectious disease dynamics model that can be used to evaluate the spread of the COVID-19 epidemic, and fitted the epidemic data in the three flat periods in England. According to the obtained parameters, according to the calculation of the model, the proportion of asymptomatic infections in these three flat periods are 41%, 53% and 58% respectively. After the first flat period, the number of daily newly confirmed cases predicted by the model began to increase around July 1, 2020. After more than four months of epidemic spread, it reached a peak on November 12, which is consistent with the actual case situation. Unanimous. After the second flat period, the model predicts that the number of new confirmed cases per day will increase from about May 7, 2021, and after about 73 days of epidemic development, it will reach a peak on July 20, showing the overall trend of the epidemic. In the above, the predicted results of the model are consistent with the actual cases. After the third flat period, the number of daily newly diagnosed cases predicted by the model began to increase around December 1, 2021, and reached a peak in December, and the number of cases will drop to a very low level after May 2022. According to our research results, due to the large number of asymptomatic infections, the spread of the epidemic is not easy to stop completely in a short time. However, when the epidemic enters a period of flat time, nucleic acid testing is performed, and asymptomatic infections are isolated at home for 14 days (the recovery period of symptomatic infection is about 10 days) may be an option that can be considered to interrupt the transmission of the case.

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    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.12.07.21267442: (What is this?)

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

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    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: 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.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

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  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.12.07.21267442v1 on medRxiv