Reproduction Numbers of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Variants: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Zhanwei Du; Caifen Liu; Chunyu Wang; Lingfeng Xu; Mingda Xu; Lin Wang; Yuan Bai; Xiaoke Xu; Eric H Y Lau; Peng Wu; Benjamin J Cowling

doi:10.1093/cid/ciac137

Reproduction Numbers of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) Variants: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis

Clin Infect Dis. 2022 Aug 24;75(1):e293-e295. doi: 10.1093/cid/ciac137.

Authors

Zhanwei Du^{1

2}, Caifen Liu^{1

2}, Chunyu Wang^{1

2}, Lingfeng Xu^{1

2

3}, Mingda Xu^{1

2

3}, Lin Wang⁴, Yuan Bai^{1

2}, Xiaoke Xu³, Eric H Y Lau^{1

2}, Peng Wu^{1

2}, Benjamin J Cowling^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ WHO Collaborating Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Control, School of Public Health, Li Ka Shing Faculty of Medicine, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China.
² Laboratory of Data Discovery for Health, Hong Kong Science and Technology Park, Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, China.
³ College of Information and Communication Engineering, Dalian Minzu University, Dalian, China.
⁴ Department of Genetics, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK.

Abstract

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic continues to pose substantial risks to public health, worsened by the emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) variants that may have a higher transmissibility and reduce vaccine effectiveness. We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis on reproduction numbers of SARS-CoV-2 variants and provided pooled estimates for each variant.

Keywords: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; meta-analysis; reproduction number; systematic review.

Publication types

Meta-Analysis
Systematic Review
Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

COVID-19* / epidemiology
Humans
Pandemics
Reproduction
SARS-CoV-2* / genetics

Supplementary concepts

SARS-CoV-2 variants