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Post-lockdown SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid screening in nearly ten million residents of Wuhan, China

Shiyi Cao, Yong Gan, Chao Wang

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Max Bachmann, Shanbo Wei, Jie Gong, Yuchai Huang, Tiantian Wang, Liqing Li, Kai Lu, Heng Jiang, Yanhong Gong, Hongbin Xu, Xin Shen, Qingfeng Tian, Chuanzhu Lv, Fujian Song, Xiaoxv Yin, Zuxun Lu

2020 · Nature Communications

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From the abstract

Abstract Stringent COVID-19 control measures were imposed in Wuhan between January 23 and April 8, 2020. Estimates of the prevalence of infection following the release of restrictions could inform post-lockdown pandemic management. Here, we describe a city-wide SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid screening programme between May 14 and June 1, 2020 in Wuhan. All city residents aged six years or older were eligible and 9,899,828 (92.9%) participated. No new symptomatic cases and 300 asymptomatic cases (detection rate 0.303/10,000, 95% CI 0.270–0.339/10,000) were identified. There were no positive tests amongst 1,174 close contacts of asymptomatic cases. 107 of 34,424 previously recovered COVID-19 patients tested positive again (re-positive rate 0.31%, 95% CI 0.423–0.574%). The prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 infection in Wuhan was therefore very low five to eight weeks after the end of lockdown.

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14 selected excerpts · 14 total mentions

floxy
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What's the latest on asymptomatic spread for covid-19? Last update I had seen was that this wasn't likely. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w
Original comment Delta Variant
DiogenesKynikos
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Lots of people on HN (and in the tech industry more broadly) live in China or have family in China. You can ask anyone you know who lives in China or who has family/friends in China what the situation has been like over the last year. Public spaces like restaurants and theaters have been open, nobody is coming down with CoVID-19, and the hospitals aren't overflowing. This would simply be impossible if there were community spread of the virus inside China. With open restaurants, theaters, etc., the virus would spread like wildfire in China's dense cities, and everyone would know about it. The strict lockdowns in early 2020 worked to bring cases very near zero, and they…
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were followed up with mass testing campaigns (for example, nearly all 11 million residents of Wuhan were tested in June 2020) to find the last few infections.[1,2] The common reaction among many people, to deny that China eliminated SARS-CoV-2 within its borders, simply isn't tenable. 1. "Post-lockdown SARS-CoV-2 nucleic acid screening in nearly ten million residents of Wuhan, China": https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w 2. "Comprehensive large-scale nucleic acid–testing strategies support China’s sustained containment of COVID-19": https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-021-01308-7
Original comment Corona Game: A simulation of how Covid-19 spreads
enriquec
Neutral mention · rule
Tegnell was proven right according to the latest research: "Previous studies have shown that asymptomatic individuals infected with SARS-CoV-2 virus were infectious3, and might subsequently become symptomatic4. Compared with symptomatic patients, asymptomatic infected persons generally have low quantity of viral loads and a short duration of viral shedding, which decrease the transmission risk of SARS-CoV-25. In the present study, virus culture was carried out on samples from asymptomatic positive cases, and found no viable SARS-CoV-2 virus. All close contacts of the asymptomatic positive cases tested negative, indicating that the asymptomatic positive cases detected in this study were unlikely to be infectious." https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w
Original comment Oxford-AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine approved for use in UK
throwaway201103
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Those "repositives" are not infectious cases though. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w "There was a low repositive rate in recovered COVID-19 patients in Wuhan. Results of virus culturing and contract tracing found no evidence that repositive cases in recovered COVID-19 patients were infectious, which is consistent with evidence from other sources." Same paper also states that asymptomatic cases are much less likely to be infectious.
Original comment Poll: Will you take the Covid vaccine?
Wintamute
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Just as a side note, asymptomatic spread is a contested topic. If asymptomatic spread were a major driver of infection, this would be the first respiratory virus to work that way. Sources: - Nature study, 20th Nov https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w - Maria Van Kerkhove, head of the WHO Emerging Diseases and Zoonosis unit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NQTBlbx1Xjs - Fauci in 2018 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vrAvjU2LBkg&feature=emb_titl...
Original comment First person receives Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine in UK
floxy
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>The difficulty with this coronavirus is that it can spread asymptomatically Can someone point me to the latest information on asymptomatic transmission of covid-19? Last I had seen asymptomatic transmission wasn't likely: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w
Original comment The end of the pandemic is near
floxy
Neutral mention · rule
>a virus that can be transmitted by asymptomatic people I thought asymptomatic transmission wasn't really a thing. Is there updated data on this? https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-020-19802-w Here's the best thing I've found for incubation period: https://bmjopen.bmj.com/content/bmjopen/10/8/e039652.full.pd...
Original comment Opinion: We’ll Have Herd Immunity by April

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