Emergence of the delta variant and risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection in secondary school students and staff: Prospective surveillance in 18 schools, England

  1. Shamez N. Ladhani
  2. Georgina Ireland
  3. Frances Baawuah
  4. Joanne Beckmann
  5. Ifeanyichukwu O. Okike
  6. Shazaad Ahmad
  7. Joanna Garstang
  8. Andrew J. Brent
  9. Bernadette Brent
  10. Felicity Aiano
  11. Zahin Amin-Chowdhury
  12. Meaghan Kall
  13. Ray Borrow
  14. Ezra Linley
  15. Maria Zambon
  16. John Poh
  17. Lenesha Warrener
  18. Angie Lackenby
  19. Joanna Ellis
  20. Gayatri Amirthalingam
  21. Kevin E. Brown
  22. Mary E. Ramsay

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Abstract

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  1. Version published to 10.1016/j.eclinm.2022.101319
  2. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.12.10.21267583: (What is this?)

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

    Table 1: Rigor

    EthicsConsent: Participants or their parent/guardian provided informed consent online via SnapSurvey, and completed a short questionnaire on COVID-19 symptoms and confirmed infection prior to the sampling day or shortly afterwards.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    Software and Algorithms
    SentencesResources
    In Rounds 1-3, serology was performed on the Abbott Architect, using a chemiluminescent microparticle immunoglobulin G (IgG) immunoassay targeting the nucleoprotein (N) (SARS-CoV-2 IgG, Abbott Commerce Chicago, USA) with a seropositivity cut-off value of 0.8 (henceforth referred to as Abbott N assay).
    Abbott Architect
    suggested: (Abbott ARCHITECT i1000sr System, RRID:SCR_019328)

    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: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Strengths and limitations: The strength of this study is the longitudinal assessment of SARS-CoV-2 infection and transmission in secondary schools. One limitation was the large numbers of students self-isolating during the final sampling visit in June/July 2021. This will have contributed to the apparent low infection rates on Round 4 school testing day, but linkage with national testing data found only 1.5% of students who did not take part in Round 4 had a confirmed COVID-19, indicating that most students were self-isolating because they had been a contact of a case. Reassuringly, though, the lower number of participants tested in Round 4 will not have impacted on seroprevalence and seroconversion rates between Rounds 3-4 because of the delay in developing an antibody response after infection and, therefore, the antibody tests performed in Round 4 would reflect infection rates at least 2-4 weeks prior to testing. Given the continuing high SARS-CoV-2 infection rates in teenagers throughout the summer months and beyond, and with COVID-19 vaccination now recommended for teenagers, it is likely that our antibody positivity rates significantly underestimate current seroprevalence. Another limitation is that participation among staff also fell during the final round, mainly because most of them were vaccinated and no longer saw study participation as an opportunity to confirm their immunity status.

    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.

    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.

  3. Version published to 10.1101/2021.12.10.21267583v1 on medRxiv