Influenza’s Plummeting During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Roles of Mask-Wearing, Mobility Change, and SARS-CoV-2 Interference

Influenza’s Plummeting During the COVID-19 Pandemic: The Roles of Mask-Wearing, Mobility Change, and SARS-CoV-2 Interference

Blog Article

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 read more effects for the international (1.7%–6.5%) invertatop squeeze bottle 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.