tetano
Editor, Senior Moderator
Epidemiol Health
. 2022 Sep 30;e2022085.
doi: 10.4178/epih.e2022085. Online ahead of print.
Seroprevalence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 antibodies during the third wave of coronavirus disease in the Seoul metropolitan area of Korea
Kyuhyun Yoon[SUP] 1 [/SUP], Jayeun Kim[SUP] 2 [/SUP], Kyong Ran Peck[SUP] 3 [/SUP], Hyun Soo Kim[SUP] 4 [/SUP], Hyukmin Lee[SUP] 5 [/SUP], Yoo-Sung Hwang[SUP] 6 [/SUP], Soon Young Lee[SUP] 7 [/SUP], Sung-Il Cho[SUP] 8 [/SUP], Hun Jae Lee[SUP] 9 [/SUP], Yeongyeong Kim[SUP] 10 [/SUP], Brian Byoungguk Kim[SUP] 11 [/SUP], June-Woo Lee[SUP] 11 [/SUP], Ah-Ra Kim[SUP] 11 [/SUP], HyeonNam Do[SUP] 11 [/SUP], Dong-Hyun Kim[SUP] 12 [/SUP]
Affiliations
Abstract
Objectives: After the third wave of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), by mid-February 2021, approximately 0.16% of the population was confirmed positive, which appeared to be one of the lowest rates worldwide at that time. However, asymptomatic transmission poses a challenge for COVID-19 surveillance. Therefore, a community-based serosurvey of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection was conducted to understand the effectiveness of Korea's strong containment strategy.
Methods: We collected 5,002 residual sera samples from January 30 to March 3, 2021 from 265 medical facilities in Seoul, 346 in Kyunggi-do' and 57 in Incheon. Among them, 60 samples from tertiary institutions were excluded. We defined the sub-regions according to the addresses of the medical facilities where the specimens were collected. Elecsys Anti-SARS-CoV-2 was used for the screening test, and positivity was confirmed using the SARS-CoV-2 sVNT Kit. Prevalence was estimated using sampling weight and the Wilson score interval for a binomial proportion with a 95% confidence interval.
Results: Among the 4,942 specimens, 32 and 25 tested positive for COVID-19 in the screening and confirmatory tests, respectively. The overall crude prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibody was 0.51%. The population-adjusted overall prevalence was 0.55% in women and 0.38% in men. The region-specific estimation was 0.67% and 0.30% in Gyeonggi-do and Seoul, respectively. No positive cases were detected in Incheon.
Conclusion: The proportion of undetected cases in South Korea remains low. Therefore, an infection control strategy with exhaustive tracing and widespread pre-emptive testing appears to be effective in containing the spread of the virus in the community.
Keywords: Asymptomatic; Coronavirus disease; Cumulative incidence; Seroprevalence; Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.
. 2022 Sep 30;e2022085.
doi: 10.4178/epih.e2022085. Online ahead of print.
Seroprevalence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 antibodies during the third wave of coronavirus disease in the Seoul metropolitan area of Korea
Kyuhyun Yoon[SUP] 1 [/SUP], Jayeun Kim[SUP] 2 [/SUP], Kyong Ran Peck[SUP] 3 [/SUP], Hyun Soo Kim[SUP] 4 [/SUP], Hyukmin Lee[SUP] 5 [/SUP], Yoo-Sung Hwang[SUP] 6 [/SUP], Soon Young Lee[SUP] 7 [/SUP], Sung-Il Cho[SUP] 8 [/SUP], Hun Jae Lee[SUP] 9 [/SUP], Yeongyeong Kim[SUP] 10 [/SUP], Brian Byoungguk Kim[SUP] 11 [/SUP], June-Woo Lee[SUP] 11 [/SUP], Ah-Ra Kim[SUP] 11 [/SUP], HyeonNam Do[SUP] 11 [/SUP], Dong-Hyun Kim[SUP] 12 [/SUP]
Affiliations
- PMID: 36228670
- DOI: 10.4178/epih.e2022085
Abstract
Objectives: After the third wave of coronavirus disease (COVID-19), by mid-February 2021, approximately 0.16% of the population was confirmed positive, which appeared to be one of the lowest rates worldwide at that time. However, asymptomatic transmission poses a challenge for COVID-19 surveillance. Therefore, a community-based serosurvey of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection was conducted to understand the effectiveness of Korea's strong containment strategy.
Methods: We collected 5,002 residual sera samples from January 30 to March 3, 2021 from 265 medical facilities in Seoul, 346 in Kyunggi-do' and 57 in Incheon. Among them, 60 samples from tertiary institutions were excluded. We defined the sub-regions according to the addresses of the medical facilities where the specimens were collected. Elecsys Anti-SARS-CoV-2 was used for the screening test, and positivity was confirmed using the SARS-CoV-2 sVNT Kit. Prevalence was estimated using sampling weight and the Wilson score interval for a binomial proportion with a 95% confidence interval.
Results: Among the 4,942 specimens, 32 and 25 tested positive for COVID-19 in the screening and confirmatory tests, respectively. The overall crude prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibody was 0.51%. The population-adjusted overall prevalence was 0.55% in women and 0.38% in men. The region-specific estimation was 0.67% and 0.30% in Gyeonggi-do and Seoul, respectively. No positive cases were detected in Incheon.
Conclusion: The proportion of undetected cases in South Korea remains low. Therefore, an infection control strategy with exhaustive tracing and widespread pre-emptive testing appears to be effective in containing the spread of the virus in the community.
Keywords: Asymptomatic; Coronavirus disease; Cumulative incidence; Seroprevalence; Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2.