SARS-CoV-2 Infection among School Population of One Developing Country. Do School Closures Protect Students and Teachers against SARS-CoV-2 Infection?

Carol Bibiana Colonia, Rosanna Camerano-Ruiz, Andrés Felipe Mora-Salamanca, Ana Beatriz Vásquez-Rodríguez, Camilo Alberto Pino-Gutiérrez, Luz Amparo Pérez-Fonseca, Deidamia García-Quintero, Jennifer Ruiz-González, Iván Osejo-Villamil, Edwin Alberto Ussa-Cristiano and Fernando de la Hoz-Restrepo
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Carol Bibiana Colonia: Epidemiología y Evaluación en Salud Pública, Departamento de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Rosanna Camerano-Ruiz: Epidemiología y Evaluación en Salud Pública, Departamento de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Andrés Felipe Mora-Salamanca: Epidemiología y Evaluación en Salud Pública, Departamento de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Ana Beatriz Vásquez-Rodríguez: Epidemiología y Evaluación en Salud Pública, Departamento de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Camilo Alberto Pino-Gutiérrez: Laboratorio de Investigación en Sistemas Inteligentes, Facultad de Ingeniería, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Luz Amparo Pérez-Fonseca: Facultad de Ciencias Humanas, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Deidamia García-Quintero: Secretaría de Educación Distrital, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Jennifer Ruiz-González: Secretaría de Educación Distrital, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Iván Osejo-Villamil: Secretaría de Educación Distrital, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Edwin Alberto Ussa-Cristiano: Secretaría de Educación Distrital, Bogotá 111321, Colombia
Fernando de la Hoz-Restrepo: Epidemiología y Evaluación en Salud Pública, Departamento de Salud Pública, Facultad de Medicina, Universidad Nacional de Colombia, Bogotá 111321, Colombia

IJERPH, 2021, vol. 18, issue 23, 1-9

Abstract: Evidence about the effectiveness of school closures as a measure to control the spread of COVID-19 is controversial. We posit that schools are not an important source of transmission; thus, we analyzed two surveillance methods: a web-based questionnaire and a telephone survey that monitored the impact of the pandemic due to COVID-19 cases in Bogotá, Colombia. We estimated the cumulative incidences for Acute Respiratory Infection (ARI) and COVID-19 for each population group. Then, we assessed the differences using the cumulative incidence ratio (CIR) and 95% confidence intervals (CI95%). The ARI incidence among students was 20.1 times higher when estimated from the telephone survey than from the online questionnaire (CIR: 20.1; CI95% 17.11–23.53). Likewise, the ARI incidence among schoolteachers was 10 times higher in the telephone survey (CIR: 9.8; CI95% 8.3–11.5). the incidence of COVID-19 among schoolteachers was 4.3 times higher than among students in the online questionnarie (CIR: 4.3, CI95%: 3.8–5.0) and 2.1 times higher in the telephone survey (CIR = 2.1, CI95%: 1.8–2.6), and this behavior was also observed in the general population data. Both methods showed a capacity to detect COVID-19 transmission among students and schoolteachers, but the telephone survey estimates were probably closer to the real incidence rate.

Keywords: COVID-19; surveys and questionnaires; school teachers; students; Colombia (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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