The Journal of infection
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The Journal of infection · Sep 2020
High SARS-CoV-2 antibody prevalence among healthcare workers exposed to COVID-19 patients.
The seroprevalence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) was examined among 105 healthcare workers (HCWs) exposed to four patients who were laboratory confirmed with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), the disease caused by SARS-CoV-2 infection. These HCWs were immediately under quarantine for 14 days as soon as they were identified as close contacts. ⋯ Risk analysis revealed that wearing face mask could reduce the infection risk (odds ratio [OR], 0.127, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.017, 0.968), while when exposed to COVID-19 patients, doctors might have higher risk of seroconversion (OR, 346.837, 95% CI 8.924, 13479.434), compared with HCWs exposed to colleagues as well as nurses and general service assistants who exposed to patients. Our study revealed that the serological testing is useful for the identification of asymptomatic or subclinical infection of SARS-CoV-2 among close contacts with COVID-19 patients.
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The Journal of infection · Sep 2020
Four point-of-care lateral flow immunoassays for diagnosis of COVID-19 and for assessing dynamics of antibody responses to SARS-CoV-2.
We aimed to evaluate the role of rapid serological tests in the management of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) patients. ⋯ Though the POC antibody rapid tests based on LFIA showed reliable performance in the detection of SARS-CoV-2-specific antibodies, the results of these tests should be interpreted and applied appropriately in the context of antibody dynamic of COVID-19 infection. COVID-19 patients complicated with pneumonia exhibited earlier anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibody response than COVID-19 patients without pneumonia.
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The Journal of infection · Sep 2020
Comment LetterMass masking as a way to contain COVID-19 and exit lockdown in low- and middle-income countries.
In new guidelines published on June 5th 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that in areas with ongoing COVID-19 community transmission, governments should encourage the general public to wear face masks in specific situations and settings as part of a comprehensive approach to suppress COVID-19 transmission. Recent online surveys in 206,729 persons residing in nine low- and middle-income countries showed that 32.7%-99.7% of respondents used face masks with significant differences across age groups and sexes. Targeted health promotion strategies and government support are required to increase mask use by the general population.