Mar 14th, 2023 - People experiencing homelessness are at high risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection. Incident infection rates have yet to be established in these communities and are needed to inform infection prevention guidance and related interventions. To quantify the SARS-CoV-2 incident infection rate among people experiencing homelessness in Toronto, Canada, in 2021 and 2022 and to assess factors associated with in...

Mar 12th, 2023 - Disentangling the effects of SARS-CoV-2 variants and vaccination on the occurrence of post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC) is crucial to estimate and reduce the burden of PASC. We performed a cross-sectional analysis (May/June 2022) within a prospective multicenter healthcare worker (HCW) cohort in North-Eastern Switzerland. HCW were stratified by viral variant and vaccination status at tim...

Feb 24th, 2023 - The crew of USS Kidd experienced a COVID-19 outbreak identified in April 2020. This is the earliest documented COVID-19 study with RT-PCR, serology, and pre-exposure test data on the entirety of the exposed population (n=333). Case definitions included 121 confirmed (36.3% of crewmembers) and 18 probable (5.4% of crewmembers) based on laboratory diagnostic test results. At the time of testing p...

Feb 24th, 2023 - Using an EHR-based algorithm we identified children with COVID-19 based exclusively on serologic testing from 3/2020 through 4/2022. The 2,714 serology-positive children were more likely to be inpatients (24% vs. 2%), have chronic conditions (37% vs 24%), or a MIS-C diagnosis (23% vs. <1%) than the 131,537 PCR-positive children. Identification of children who could have been asymptomatic or pau...

Feb 18th, 2023 - New-onset chronic pain has been acknowledged as part of the post-COVID-19 condition. However, available fine-grained data about its clinical phenotype, trajectories and main associated characteristics remain scarce. We described the distinct temporal evolutions of post-COVID-19 pain and their epidemiological and phenotypical features. A prospective cross-sectional study enrolled post-COVID-19 c...

Feb 16th, 2023 - Estimating the true burden of SARS-CoV-2 infection has been difficult in sub-Saharan Africa owing to asymptomatic infections and inadequate testing capacity. Antibody responses from serologic surveys can provide an estimate of SARS-CoV-2 exposure at the population level. To estimate SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence, attack rates, and reinfection in eastern Uganda using serologic surveillance from 2020...

Feb 15th, 2023 - A higher risk of suicidal ideation associated with self-report of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)-like symptoms or COVID-19 infection has been observed in cross-sectional studies, but evidence from longitudinal studies remains limited. The aims of this study were 2-fold: (1) to explore if self-reported COVID-19-like symptoms in 2020 were associated with suicidal ideation in 2021; (2) to exp...

Feb 15th, 2023 - To determine clinical differences for children with complete Kawasaki disease (KD) with and without evidence of preceding SARS-CoV-2 infection. From January 2020, contemporaneous patients with complete KD criteria were classified as either SARS-CoV-2 positive (KDCOVID+; confirmed household exposure, positive PCR and/or serology) or SARS-CoV-2 negative (KDCOVID-; negative testing and no exposure...

Feb 14th, 2023 - From the first-generation options available in 1985, tests to detect HIV-1 specific antibodies have increased its sensitivity and specificity. HIV-1 and SARS-CoV-2 surface glycoproteins present a certain degree of homology and shared epitope motifs which results of relevance as both pandemics co-exist. Here, we aimed to evaluate the rate of false positive HIV serology results among individuals ...

Feb 11th, 2023 - As diagnostic tests for COVID-19 were broadly deployed under Emergency Use Authorization, there emerged a need to understand the real-world utilization and performance of serological testing across the United States. Six health systems contributed electronic health records and/or claims data, jointly developed a master protocol, and used it to execute the analysis in parallel. We used descripti...

Feb 8th, 2023 - Immune responses to COVID-19 infection and vaccination are individual and varied. There is a need to understand the timeline of vaccination efficacy against current and yet to be discovered viral mutations. Assessing immunity to SARS-CoV-2 in the context of immunity to other respiratory viruses is also valuable. Here we demonstrate the capability of a fully automated prototype Arrayed Imaging R...

Feb 8th, 2023 - The COVID-19 has led to a significant increase in demand for remote blood sampling in clinical trials. This study aims to ascertain the concordance between venous versus capillary samples, processed immediately or exposed to various pre-analytical conditions. Participants (≥12 years old) provided a venous blood sample (processed immediately) and capillary samples, allocated to one of the follow...

Feb 4th, 2023 - Real-world performance of COVID-19 diagnostic tests under Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) must be assessed. We describe overall trends in the performance of serology tests in the context of real-world implementation. Six health systems estimated the odds of seropositivity and positive percent agreement (PPA) of serology test among people with confirmed SARS-CoV-2 infection by molecular test. ...

Feb 4th, 2023 - COVID-19 pandemic caused by extended variants of SARS-CoV-2 has infected more than 350 million people, resulting in over 5.5 million deaths globally. However, the actual burden of the pandemic in Africa, particularly among children, remains largely unknown. We aimed to assess the seroepidemiological changes of SARS-CoV-2 infection after school reopening among school children in Oromia, Ethiopia...

Feb 3rd, 2023 - Disease intervention specialists are often at the forefront of adoption of new technologies in support of sexually transmitted infection (STI) contact tracing efforts. Newer technology for detection of treatable STI includes point-of-care (POC) molecular tests for detection of chlamydia gonorrhea and trichomonas and syphilis serology POC tests. Other additions to our case finding toolbox are th...

Feb 3rd, 2023 - The role of children in SARS-CoV-2 transmission and their immune response after infection have been profoundly discussed. Hereby, we analyze both aspects in a Spanish pediatric population. Prospective, multicentre, longitudinal study performed from July 2020 to September 2021 in children up to 14 years old. Venous blood samples were collected every 6 months and serum was analyzed for antibodies...

Jan 26th, 2023 - Context: In March 2020 a COVID-19 Community Research Partnership (CRP) surveillance study was launched. We describe the barriers and facilitators to recruitment and retention during enrollment of >12,000 participants. Objective: To describe the barriers and facilitators to recruitment and retention while collecting daily syndromic and serologic data in a virtual setting. Methods: Key communicat...

Jan 24th, 2023 - To investigate the robustness and longevity of SARS-CoV-2 immune responses conferred by natural infection and vaccination among priority populations such as immunocompromised individuals and people with post-acute sequelae of COVID-19 in a prospective cohort study (Stop the Spread Ottawa-SSO) in adults living in the Ottawa region. In this paper, we describe the study design, ongoing data collec...

Jan 21st, 2023 - Healthcare workers (HCW) are most vulnerable to contracting COVID-19 infection. Understanding the extent of human-to-human transmission of the COVID-19 infection among HCWs is critical in managing this infection and for policy making. We did this study to estimate new infection by seroconversion among HCWs in recent contact with COVID-19 and predict the risk factors for infection. A cohort stud...

Jan 20th, 2023 - The aim of this study was to measure the extent of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) infection among workers at the Institut Pasteur de Tunis (IPT), a public health laboratory involved in the management of the COVID-19 pandemic in Tunisia, and to identify risk factors for infection in this occupational setting. A cross-sectional survey was conducted on IPT workers not...