Asset Publisher

Research & Innovation Programmes
Research

Spatio-temporal analysis of COVID-19 cases to inform scaling down of confinement measures as well as reactive strategies onward

A modelling analysis

Women wearing a mask and buying
Photo: Anna Shvets
Duration
04/05/2020 - 31/08/2020
Coordinator
Carlos Chaccour

The COVID-19 pandemic has now spread to almost all countries around the world. The response in almost all countries in Europe has been to implement a series of “non-pharmaceutical interventions” (NPIs) – including a banning of mass gatherings, closure of schools and universities, and more general restrictions on populations movements including full lockdowns. In most countries, we now have evidence to show that these NPIs have significantly reduced transmission such that the reproductive number – the average number of new infections generated by each initial infection – is close to or just below the threshold value of 1 required to bring the epidemic under control (Flaxman et al. 2020). However, there remains considerable uncertainty as to how these measures can be relaxed in the coming weeks and months whilst ensuring there are no rebound epidemics.

One of the proposed methods for relaxing existing interventions is to restrict movements to a smaller subset of the population. Two approaches are possible, alone or in tandem:

  • Restrict the movement of those at highest risk from severe disease – essentially shielding this population whilst allowing a degree of ongoing transmission in the lower risk population
  • Using app-based technology, combined with rapid testing, to rapidly isolate cases and their contacts.

The detailed data collected by the Catalonian government provide the opportunity to better understand the impact of these two approaches.

Our Team

Coordinator

  • CARLOS CHACCOUR
    CARLOS CHACCOUR Assistant Research Professor. BOHEMIA Co-PI and Chief Scientific Officer

ISGlobal involved staff

  • SERGI SANZ
    SERGI SANZ Head of Department - Statistics
  • Aina Casellas Torrentó
    Aina Casellas Torrentó

Other projects

See Past Projects

COMBACTE

Combating Bacterial Resistance In Europe

GAMA

Development of Novel Gastrointestinal Biomarkers for Use in HIV Incidence Determination in a Sub-Saharan African Setting

COMBACTE-CARE

Combatting Bacterial Resistance in Europe - Carbapenem Resistance

MAMAH

Improving Maternal and Infant Health by reducing malaria risks in African women: evaluation of the safety and efficacy of dihydroartemisinin-piperaquine for intermittent preventive treatment of malaria in HIV-infected pregnant women

INTE-AFRICA

Integrating and decentralizing diabetes and hypertension services in Africa

ICARIA

Improving Care through Azithromycin Research for Infants in Africa

PreFIT

Predicting the Future: Incipient Tuberculosis

ANTICOV

Large Clinical Trial in Africa on the Treatment of Mild Cases of COVID-19

Stool4TB

Evaluating a new stool based qPCR for diagnosis of tuberculosis in children and people living with HIV

TB-RECONNECT

Reconnecting Transmission to Global Tuberculosis Control by Mapping Pathogen Transmission Events to Host Infection Status

SToolNIH

Quantifiable stool-based TB PCR to Improve Diagnostics and Treatment Monitoring

END-VOC

ENDing COVID-19 Variants Of concern through Cohort studies (END-VOC)

TwinAir

Digital Twins Enabled Indoor Air Quality Management for Healthy Living

ENDÈMIC

Community knowledge generation through scientific culture, urban ecology and art

EpiGen

Building Scalable Pathogen Genomic Epidemiology in Ethiopia

Hepatitis C Free Baleares

Eliminating hepatitis C on the Balearic Islands (Mallorca, Menorca and Ibiza): a study in governmental and non-governmental addiction service centres, a mobile methadone unit and a prison to test and link people who use drugs to HCV care.

FLAVOBAC

Nuevas moléculas de oro coordinadas con flavonoides contra bacterias patógenas multirresistentes prioritarias