Effects of B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 on COVID-19 dynamics. A campus reopening study

Abstract

The timing and sequence of safe campus reopening has remained the most controversial topic in higher education since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic. By the end of March 2020, almost all colleges and universities in the United States had transitioned to an all online education and many institutions have not yet fully reopened to date. For a residential campus like Stanford University, the major challenge of reopening is to estimate the number of incoming infectious students at the first day of class. Here we learn the number of incoming infectious students using Bayesian inference and perform a series of retrospective and projective simulations to quantify the risk of campus reopening. We create a physics-based probabilistic model to infer the local reproduction dynamics for each state and adopt a network SEIR model to simulate the return of all undergraduates, broken down by their year of enrollment and state of origin. From these returning student populations, we predict the outbreak dynamics throughout the spring, summer, fall, and winter quarters using the inferred reproduction dynamics of Santa Clara County. We compare three different scenarios: the true outbreak dynamics under the wild-type SARS-CoV-2, and the hypothetical outbreak dynamics under the new COVID-19 variants B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 with 56% and 50% increased transmissibility. Our study reveals that even small changes in transmissibility can have an enormous impact on the overall case numbers. With no additional countermeasures, during the most affected quarter, the fall of 2020, there would have been 203 cases under base-line reproduction, compared to 4727 and 4256 cases for the B.1.1.7 and B.1.351 variants. Our results suggest that population mixing presents an increased risk for local outbreaks, especially with new and more infectious variants emerging across the globe. Tight outbreak control through mandatory quarantine and test-trace-isolate strategies will be critical in successfully managing these local outbreak dynamics.

Public health implications of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern: a rapid scoping review

“…A total of 37 studies reporting on public health measures in relation to VOC were included after screening. The majority of included studies reported on the Alpha VOC (n=32) 24–54. The majority of studies were conducted in Europe (n=12),24 29 30 34 35 39 40 44 47 51 53 55 followed by the UK (n=9),26 28 32 33 36 42 45 50 56 USA (n=9),25 37 38 41 43 48 49 54 57 Brazil (n=3),58–60 Canada (n=1),31 South Africa (n=1),27 Israel (n=1)46 and Japan (n=1)52 (figure 2).…”

“…The majority of included studies reported on the Alpha VOC (n=32) 24–54. The majority of studies were conducted in Europe (n=12),24 29 30 34 35 39 40 44 47 51 53 55 followed by the UK (n=9),26 28 32 33 36 42 45 50 56 USA (n=9),25 37 38 41 43 48 49 54 57 Brazil (n=3),58–60 Canada (n=1),31 South Africa (n=1),27 Israel (n=1)46 and Japan (n=1)52 (figure 2). Additional details of each study can be found in the online supplemental material 2.…”

“…The second subquestion addressed by this review related to the impact of infection prevention measures, such as hand washing, mask wearing and physical distancing, in the presence of VOC. Of the seven studies which reported on this subtopic, five were modelling studies,34 37 40 41 53 one was a laboratory-based study44 and one was observational 26. The observational study was appraised as medium quality.…”

“…Five studies assessed the impact of physical distancing on transmission of Alpha26 34 40 41 53 and/or Beta 41. Together, these studies found that due to the increased transmissibility between contacts, additional NPIs should be in place alongside physical distancing measures to contain VOC spread 26 34 40 41 53. These studies considered various settings, including community,34 workplaces,53 schools26 40 and universities 41…”

“…26 34 40 41 53 These studies considered various settings, including community, 34 workplaces, 53 schools 26 40 and universities. 41…”