Abstract
Background: Asymptomatic and pre-symptomatic SARS-CoV-2 infections may contribute to ongoing community transmission, however, the benefit of routine screening of asymptomatic individuals in low-risk populations is unclear.
Methods: To identify SARS-CoV-2 infections 553 seronegative individuals were prospectively followed for 52 weeks. From 4/2020-7/2021, participants submitted weekly self-collected nasal swabs for rtPCR and completed symptom and exposure surveys.
Results: Incident SARS2-CoV-2 infections were identified in 9/553 (1.6%) participants. Comparisons of SARS2-CoV-2(+) to SARS2-CoV-2(-) participants revealed significantly more close contacts outside the household (median: 5 versus 3; p = 0.005). The incidence of infection was higher among unvaccinated/partially vaccinated than among fully vaccinated participants (9/7,679 versus 0/6,845 person-weeks; p = 0.004). At notification of positive test result, eight cases were symptomatic and one pre-symptomatic.
Conclusions: These data suggest that weekly SARS2-CoV2 surveillance by rtPCR did not efficiently detect pre-symptomatic infections in unvaccinated participants.
【초록키워드】 SARS-COV-2 infection, Infection, Symptom, Population, Surveillance, pre-symptomatic, symptomatic, community transmission, incidence, nasal swab, seronegative, close contact, Participants, individual, participant, positive test result, incident, benefit, asymptomatic individual, identify, detect, significantly more, eight, contribute, submitted, 【제목키워드】 SARS-CoV-2, Infection, cohort study, PCR,