Quarantine works best at low case numbers

Embargoed until: Publicly released: 2021-09-08 09:01

International

Aggressive quarantine works best to stop the spread of COVID-19 when case numbers are low, while populations with a higher base rate of infection should rely more on social distancing by all, according to international research. The study found that when case counts are low, quarantine is justified even for individuals at low risk of onward transmission. The authors say that vaccination makes little difference to the value of quarantine unless the vaccinated are exempt from distancing policies.

Media release

From: The Royal Society

The economic value of quarantine is higher at lower case prevalence, with quarantine justified at lower risk of infection

It is difficult to put an economic value on COVID-19 measures that save lives while impacting livelihoods. In this work, we avoid such comparisons by holding lives and health outcomes constant and calculating how much more efficiently the same level of pandemic control can be obtained by using targeted quarantine instead of indiscriminate restrictions. Even modest increases in information for targeted testing, tracing, and quarantine have extremely high economic value. When case counts are low, quarantine is justified even for individuals at low risk of onward transmission.

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Research The Royal Society, Web page Please link to the article in online versions of your report (the URL will go live after the embargo ends).

Journal/
conference: Journal of the Royal Society Interface

Research:Paper

Organisation/s: University of Waterloo, Canada

Funder: J.P. acknowledges support from the Ontario Graduate Scholarship.

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