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Transmission Dynamics of the Etiological Agent of SARS in Hong Kong: Impact of Public Health Interventions
Abstract
We present an analysis of the first 10 weeks of the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic in Hong Kong. The epidemic to date has been characterized by two large clusters—initiated by two separate “super-spread” events (SSEs)—and by ongoing community transmission. By fitting a stochastic model to data on 1512 cases, including these clusters, we show that the etiological agent of SARS is moderately transmissible. Excluding SSEs, we estimate that 2.7 secondary infections were generated per case on average at the start of the epidemic, with a substantial contribution from hospital transmission. Transmission rates fell during the epidemic, primarily as a result of reductions in population contact rates and improved hospital infection control, but also because of more rapid hospital attendance by symptomatic individuals. As a result, the epidemic is now in decline, although continued vigilance is necessary for this to be maintained. Restrictions on longer range population movement are shown to be a potentially useful additional control measure in some contexts. We estimate that most currently infected persons are now hospitalized, which highlights the importance of control of nosocomial transmission.
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Cited by
Wu, J. T., Leung, K., & Leung, G. M. (2020) · The Lancet · doi:10.1016/s0140-6736(20)30260-9 · Cited by 4,389
Self-citationThe effect of travel restrictions on the spread of the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak
Chinazzi, M., Davis, J. T., Ajelli, M., Gioannini, C., Litvinova, M., Merler, S., Pastore y Piontti, A., Mu, K., Rossi, L., Sun, K., et al. (2020) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.aba9757 · Cited by 3,694
Social Contacts and Mixing Patterns Relevant to the Spread of Infectious Diseases
Mossong, J., Hens, N., Jit, M., Beutels, P., Auranen, K., Mikolajczyk, R., Massari, M., Salmaso, S., Tomba, G. S., Wallinga, J., et al. (2008) · PLoS Medicine · doi:10.1371/journal.pmed.0050074 · Cited by 2,900
“This similarity implies that the results may well be applicable to other European countries, and that the initial phase of spread of newly emerging infections in susceptible populations, such as SARS was in 2003, is likely to be very similar across Europe and in countries with similar social structures.”
BackgroundInfluentialSuperspreading and the effect of individual variation on disease emergence
Lloyd-Smith, J. O., Schreiber, S. J., Kopp, P. E., & Getz, W. M. (2005) · Nature · doi:10.1038/nature04153 · Cited by 2,514
Prem, K., Liu, Y., Russell, T. W., Kucharski, A. J., Eggo, R. M., Davies, N., Flasche, S., Clifford, S., Pearson, C. A. B., Munday, J. D., et al. (2020) · The Lancet Public Health · doi:10.1016/s2468-2667(20)30073-6 · Cited by 2,114
Metadata
- Authors
- Riley, S., Fraser, C., Donnelly, C. A., Ghani, A. C., Abu-Raddad, L. J., Hedley, A. J., Leung, G. M., Ho, L.-M., Lam, T.-H., Thach, T. Q., Chau, P., Chan, K.-P., Lo, S.-V., Leung, P.-Y., Tsang, T., Ho, W., Lee, K.-H., Lau, E. M. C., Ferguson, N. M., & Anderson, R. M.
- Venue
- Science
- Published
- 2003-06-20
- Volume
- 300
- Issue
- 5627
- Pages
- 1961-1966
- ISSN
- 0036-8075 (ISSN-L)
- 1095-9203
- OpenAlex
- W2096145431
- Cited by
- 1,150
- References
- 0
- FWCI
- 121.12
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
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- Riley, S., Fraser, C., Donnelly, C. A., Ghani, A. C., Abu-Raddad, L. J., Hedley, A. J., Leung, G. M., Ho, L.-M., Lam, T.-H., Thach, T. Q., Chau, P., Chan, K.-P., Lo, S.-V., Leung, P.-Y., Tsang, T., Ho, W., Lee, K.-H., Lau, E. M. C., Ferguson, N. M., & Anderson, R. M. (2003). Transmission Dynamics of the Etiological Agent of SARS in Hong Kong: Impact of Public Health Interventions. Science. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1086478
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Contains information from the Semantic Scholar Academic Graph Datasets, made available under the ODC Attribution License (ODC-BY 1.0).
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