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SUMMARY:Effectiveness of symptomatic and asymptomatic testing strategies o
 n reducing transmission in a population with high vaccination coverage &am
 p\;Inferring the relationship between viral load and infectiousness using 
 contact tracing data - Dr Miguel Silva\, University of Manchester &amp\; D
 r Martyn Fyles\, University of Manchester
DTSTART:20211124T160000Z
DTEND:20211124T170000Z
UID:TALK166489@talks.cam.ac.uk
CONTACT:Dr Ciara Dangerfield
DESCRIPTION:Members of the recent COVID-19 rapid response project on Test\
 , Trace and Isolation interventions (TTI) for control of SARS CoV-2 in the
  UK\, will present two strands of work. The first investigates the effecti
 veness of asymptomatic and symptomatic testing and tracing in reducing tra
 nsmission in a population with high levels of immunity\, for different tes
 ting frequencies\, levels of uptake\, contact levels and growth rates. We 
 compare these policies to those akin to restrictions on social contacts (%
  reductions in workplace\, school and other community settings). We find t
 hat perfect adherence to the current policy of asymptomatic testing twice 
 a week on lateral flow tests\, against a background of imperfect symptomat
 ic isolation and PCR testing\, yields a reduction in total number of infec
 tions by up to 20%\, comparable to a reduction in the number of non-househ
 old contacts of 10%.\nThe second piece of work describes an analysis to de
 termine infectiousness by viral load. Test sensitivity varies by viral loa
 d at the time of testing\, which itself varies strongly by infectious age.
  Infectiousness has been shown to vary by viral load\, but we lack detail 
 as to this exact relationship\, which is key for fully representing the va
 riation in viral load trajectories and implications for both test sensitiv
 ity and infectivity in models of TTI. Here we present a method to update e
 xisting analyses of the relationship between viral load and infectivity in
  contact tracing data\, accounting for some identified biases.
LOCATION:Zoom
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