학술논문
Epidemiological, virological and serological investigation of a SARS-CoV-2 outbreak (Alpha variant) in a primary school: A prospective longitudinal study.
Document Type
Article
Author
Lorthe, Elsa; Bellon, Mathilde; Michielin, Grégoire; Berthelot, Julie; Zaballa, María-Eugenia; Pennacchio, Francesco; Bekliz, Meriem; Laubscher, Florian; Arefi, Fatemeh; Perez-Saez, Javier; Azman, Andrew S.; L'Huillier, Arnaud G.; Posfay-Barbe, Klara M.; Kaiser, Laurent; Guessous, Idris; Maerkl, Sebastian J.; Eckerle, Isabella; Stringhini, Silvia
Source
Subject
*SARS-CoV-2
*WHOLE genome sequencing
*PRIMARY schools
*SCHOOL children
*ANTIGEN analysis
*LONGITUDINAL method
*NUCLEOTIDE sequencing
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Language
ISSN
1932-6203
Abstract
Objectives: To report a prospective epidemiological, virological and serological investigation of a SARS-CoV-2 outbreak in a primary school. Methods: As part of a longitudinal, prospective, school-based surveillance study, this investigation involved repeated testing of 73 pupils, 9 teachers, 13 non-teaching staff and 26 household members of participants who tested positive, with rapid antigen tests and/or RT-PCR (Day 0–2 and Day 5–7), serologies on dried capillary blood samples (Day 0–2 and Day 30), contact tracing interviews and SARS-CoV-2 whole genome sequencing. Results: We identified 20 children (aged 4 to 6 years from 4 school classes), 2 teachers and a total of 4 household members who were infected by the Alpha variant during this outbreak. Infection attack rates were between 11.8 and 62.0% among pupils from the 4 school classes, 22.2% among teachers and 0% among non-teaching staff. Secondary attack rate among household members was 15.4%. Symptoms were reported by 63% of infected children, 100% of teachers and 50% of household members. All analysed sequences but one showed 100% identity. Serological tests detected 8 seroconversions unidentified by SARS-CoV-2 virological tests. Conclusions: This study confirmed child-to-child and child-to-adult SARS-CoV-2 transmission and introduction into households. Effective measures to limit transmission in schools have the potential to reduce the overall community circulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]