Identification of COVID-19 Waves: Considerations for Research and Policy.
Int J Environ Res Public Health
; 18(21)2021 10 21.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1480745
ABSTRACT
The identification of COVID-19 waves is a matter of the utmost importance, both for research and decision making. This study uses COVID-19 information from the 52 municipalities of the Metropolitan Region, Chile, and presents a quantitative method-based on weekly accumulated incidence rates-to define COVID-19 waves. We explore three different criteria to define the duration of a wave, and performed a sensitivity analysis using multivariate linear models to show their commonalities and differences. The results show that, compared to a benchmark definition (a 100-day wave), the estimations using longer periods of study are worse in terms of the model's overall fit (adjusted R2). The article shows that defining a COVID-19 wave is not necessarily simple, and has consequences when performing data analysis. The results highlight the need to adopt well-defined and well-justified definitions for COVID-19 waves, since these methodological choices can have an impact in research and policy making.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
COVID-19
Type of study:
Observational study
Limits:
Humans
Language:
English
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Ijerph182111058
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