2023, Volume 21, Issue 2
Engineering >> 2023, Volume 21, Issue 2 doi: 10.1016/j.eng.2021.12.011
Influenza's Plummeting during the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Roles of Mask-Wearing, Mobility Change, and SARS-CoV-2 Interference
a Beijing International Center for Mathematical Research, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
b Harvard Medical School, Harvard University, Boston, MA 02115, USA
c School of Population Medicine and Public Health, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences & Peking Union Medical College, Beijing 100730, China
d Academy for Advanced Interdisciplinary Studies, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
e WorldPop, School of Geography and Environmental Science, University of Southampton, Southampton SO17 1BJ, United Kingdom
f Division for Infectious Diseases, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing 102206, China
g Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
h National Engineering Laboratory of Big Data Analysis and Applied Technology, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China
# These authors contributed equally to this work.
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Abstract
Seasonal influenza activity typically peaks in the winter months but plummeted globally during the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic. Unraveling lessons from influenza's unprecedented low profile is critical in informing preparedness for incoming influenza seasons. Here, we explored a country-specific inference model to estimate the effects of mask-wearing, mobility changes (international and domestic), and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) interference in China, England, and the United States. We found that a one-week increase in mask-wearing intervention had a percent reduction of 11.3%–35.2% in influenza activity in these areas. The one-week mobility mitigation had smaller effects for the international (1.7%–6.5%) and the domestic community (1.6%–2.8%). In 2020–2021, the mask-wearing intervention alone could decline percent positivity by 13.3–19.8. The mobility change alone could reduce percent positivity by 5.2–14.0, of which 79.8%–98.2% were attributed to the deflected international travel. Only in 2019–2020, SARS-CoV-2 interference had statistically significant effects. There was a reduction in percent positivity of 7.6 (2.4–14.4) and 10.2 (7.2–13.6) in northern China and England, respectively. Our results have implications for understanding how influenza evolves under non-pharmaceutical interventions and other respiratory diseases and will inform health policy and the design of tailored public health measures.
Keywords
Influenza ; Mask-wearing ; Mobility mitigation ; SARS-CoV-2 interference ; Non-pharmaceutical interventions
SupplementaryMaterials
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