Proportion of asymptomatic coronavirus disease 2019: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
J Med Virol
; 93(2): 820-830, 2021 02.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1196410
ABSTRACT
We aim to systematically review the characteristics of asymptomatic infection in the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). PubMed and EMBASE were electronically searched to identify original studies containing the rate of asymptomatic infection in COVID-19 patients before 20 May 2020. Then mate-analysis was conducted using R version 3.6.2. A total of 50 155 patients from 41 studies with confirmed COVID-19 were included. The pooled percentage of asymptomatic infection is 15.6% (95% CI, 10.1%-23.0%). Ten included studies contain the number of presymptomatic patients, who were asymptomatic at screening point and developed symptoms during follow-up. The pooled percentage of presymptomatic infection among 180 initially asymptomatic patients is 48.9% (95% CI, 31.6%-66.2%). The pooled proportion of asymptomatic infection among 1152 COVID-19 children from 11 studies is 27.7% (95% CI, 16.4%-42.7%), which is much higher than patients from all aged groups. Abnormal CT features are common in asymptomatic COVID-19 infection. For 36 patients from 4 studies that CT results were available, 15 (41.7%) patients had bilateral involvement and 14 (38.9%) had unilateral involvement in CT results. Reduced white blood cell count, increased lactate dehydrogenase, and increased C-reactive protein were also recorded. About 15.6% of confirmed COVID-19 patients are asymptomatic. Nearly half of the patients with no symptoms at detection time will develop symptoms later. Children are likely to have a higher proportion of asymptomatic infection than adults. Asymptomatic COVID-19 patients could have abnormal laboratory and radiational manifestations, which can be used as screening strategies to identify asymptomatic infection.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
C-Reactive Protein
/
COVID-19
/
L-Lactate Dehydrogenase
Type of study:
Cohort study
/
Diagnostic study
/
Experimental Studies
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Randomized controlled trials
/
Reviews
/
Systematic review/Meta Analysis
Limits:
Female
/
Humans
/
Male
Country/Region as subject:
Asia
Language:
English
Journal:
J Med Virol
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Jmv.26326
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