One Health Investigation of SARS-CoV-2 Infection and Seropositivity among Pets in Households with Confirmed Human COVID-19 Cases—Utah and Wisconsin, 2020
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Abstract
Approximately 67% of U.S. households have pets. Limited data are available on SARS-CoV-2 in pets. We assessed SARS-CoV-2 infection in pets during a COVID-19 household transmission investigation. Pets from households with ≥1 person with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 were eligible for inclusion from April–May 2020. We enrolled 37 dogs and 19 cats from 34 households. All oropharyngeal, nasal, and rectal swabs tested negative by rRT-PCR; one dog’s fur swabs (2%) tested positive by rRT-PCR at the first sampling. Among 47 pets with serological results, eight (17%) pets (four dogs, four cats) from 6/30 (20%) households had detectable SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibodies. In households with a seropositive pet, the proportion of people with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 was greater (median 79%; range: 40–100%) compared to households with no seropositive pet (median 37%; range: 13–100%) (p = 0.01). Thirty-three pets with serologic results had frequent daily contact (≥1 h) with the index patient before the person’s COVID-19 diagnosis. Of these 33 pets, 14 (42%) had decreased contact with the index patient after diagnosis and none were seropositive; of the 19 (58%) pets with continued contact, four (21%) were seropositive. Seropositive pets likely acquired infection after contact with people with COVID-19. People with COVID-19 should restrict contact with pets and other animals.
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SciScore for 10.1101/2021.04.11.439379: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Table 2: Resources
Software and Algorithms Sentences Resources Analysis: Characteristics of enrolled pets, risk factors for seropositivity, number of human cases and household infection rates, and clinical features of human cases within households were analyzed using SAS version 9.4 (SAS Institute, Cary NC). SAS Institutesuggested: (Statistical Analysis System, RRID:SCR_008567)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).
Result…SciScore for 10.1101/2021.04.11.439379: (What is this?)
Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.
Table 1: Rigor
Institutional Review Board Statement not detected. Randomization not detected. Blinding not detected. Power Analysis not detected. Sex as a biological variable not detected. Table 2: Resources
Software and Algorithms Sentences Resources Analysis: Characteristics of enrolled pets, risk factors for seropositivity, number of human cases and household infection rates, and clinical features of human cases within households were analyzed using SAS version 9.4 (SAS Institute, Cary NC). SAS Institutesuggested: (Statistical Analysis System, RRID:SCR_008567)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 findings provide additional characterization of potential SARS-CoV-2 transmission from people with laboratory-confirmed COVID-19 to pets in households; however, several limitations are noted. While directionality cannot be proven based on these results, the epidemiological information gathered, in conjunction with what is currently known about disease course and shedding of SARS-CoV-2 in companion animals, suggests that human infection preceded animal infection. In experimental infection studies, viral RNA was detected up to the study endpoint--12 days post-infection for cats9,12,13, while only on day 6 for dogs9. However in cases of natural infection, viral RNA was detected up to 14 and 19 days in dogs6 and cats26,27, respectively, post-confirmatory testing of the index patient. In this investigation, the median time from symptom onset of the index patient to specimen collection was 27 days (range:3–46 days) and the median time from first positive diagnostic result of the index patient to specimen collection was 20·5 days (range:3-42 days), which would have missed the shedding window for infected pets and could explain the lack of viral RNA detection. The time to pet sampling from the index patient’s symptom onset and from diagnosis were similar among households with and without seropositive pets, and therefore, most pets had a similar length of time to mount neutralizing antibody responses since the beginning of their exposure to the household’s human case(s). Additiona...
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.
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