The following is a summary of “A two-variant model of SARS-COV-2 transmission: estimating the characteristics of a newly emerging strain,” published in the September 2024 issue of Infectious Diseases by Yamana et al.
The COVID-19 pandemic was depicted by the emergence of novel SARS-CoV-2 variants, each with different properties impacting transmission dynamics, immune escape, and virulence, which, in turn, affected their result on local populations.
Researchers conducted a retrospective study to assess a 2 variant metapopulation compartmental model of disease transmission to simulate the dynamics of disease transmission during a transition period to a newly dominant strain.
They used novel S-gene dropout analysis data and genomic sequencing data, merged with COVID-19-confirmed data; researchers evaluated the epidemiological characteristics of the Omicron variant, which replaced the Delta variant in late 2021 in Philadelphia, PA. A grid-search method was used to determine likely combinations of model parameters, with an ensemble adjustment Kalman filter for parameter inference.
The results showed the model successfully calculated essential epidemiological parameters, the ascertainment rate of 0.22 (95% CI 0.15–0.29) and transmission rate of 5.0 (95% CI 2.4–6.6) for the Omicron variant.
They concluded that the model-inference framework provided real-time insights during the emergence of novel variants, helping to facilitate public health responses.
Source: bmcinfectdis.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12879-024-09823-x
