COVID-19 outbreak rates and infection attack rates associated with the workplace: a descriptive epidemiological study
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Abstract
A large number of COVID-19 outbreaks/clusters have been reported in a variety of workplace settings since the start of the pandemic but the rate of outbreak occurrence in the workplace has not previously been assessed. The objectives of this paper are to identify the geographical areas and industrial sectors with a high rate of outbreaks of COVID-19 and to compare infection attack rates by enterprise size and sector in England.
Methods
Public Health England (PHE) HPZone data on COVID-19 outbreaks in workplaces, between 18 May and 12 October 2020, were analysed. The workplace outbreak rates by region and sector were calculated, using National Population Database (NPD) with the total number of workplaces as the denominator. The infection attack rates were calculated by enterprise size and sector using PHE Situations of Interest data with the number of test-confirmed COVID-19 cases in a workplace outbreak as the numerator and using NPD data with the number employed in that workplace as the denominator.
Results
The highest attack rate was for outbreaks in close contact services (median 16.5%), followed by outbreaks in restaurants and catering (median 10.2%), and in manufacturers and packers of non-food products (median 6.7%). The overall outbreak rate was 66 per 100 000 workplaces. Of the nine English regions, the North West had the highest workplace outbreak rate (155 per 100 000 workplaces). Of the industrial sectors, manufacturers and packers of food had the highest outbreak rate (1672 per 100 000), which was consistent across seven of the regions. In addition, high outbreak rates in warehouses were observed in the East Midlands and the North West.
Conclusions
Early identification of geographical regions and industrial sectors with higher rates of COVID-19 workplace outbreaks can inform interventions to limit transmission of SARS-CoV-2.
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SciScore for 10.1101/2021.05.06.21256757: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Ethics not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not 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: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:Our analysis carried some limitations. The potential under-identification of outbreaks in small enterprises (<50 employees) in the numerator coupled with the vast number of small enterprises in the denominator may greatly underestimate the outbreak rates. …
SciScore for 10.1101/2021.05.06.21256757: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Ethics not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not 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: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:Our analysis carried some limitations. The potential under-identification of outbreaks in small enterprises (<50 employees) in the numerator coupled with the vast number of small enterprises in the denominator may greatly underestimate the outbreak rates. This could particularly impact on small business-dominated sectors, such as close contact services and restaurants/caterers, where estimated outbreak rates were relatively low, but attack rates were relatively high. The number of outbreaks reported to HPZone could be affected by national and local level operational changes. For example, as caseload increased in September and October 2020, some HPTs transferred the management of some outbreaks/clusters to local authorities. As a result, HPZone no longer represents a comprehensive list of COVID-19 outbreaks/clusters in England. The impact of this change is unclear. This practice also varies regionally, which affects the ability to measure the changes of outbreak occurrence or outbreak rate over time, as well as the ability to measure regional variations using HPZone data. SOI outbreak data is a subset of the HPZone outbreaks/clusters with no clear selection criteria. Data entry was through a separate mechanism and was an additional task for HPTs, with no perceived added benefit to the operational management of the outbreaks/clusters. The proportion of HPZone outbreaks/clusters in the workplace being reported as SOI decreased over time, especially from September 2020 onward as ...
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.
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- No protocol registration statement was detected.
Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.
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