Virtual Childcare Centers: Predicting Optimal Strategies against the Spread of SARS-CoV-2 Variants

During the recent SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, governments worldwide have implemented several interven-tions to prevent the viral spread, such as the closure of day care centers for children. This resulted in negativeeffects on children’s health and well-being [6]. Therefore, we aim to identify optimal surveillance strategiesthat prevent the closure of day care centers while minimizing the viral spread.In previous studies, we developed a stochastic individual-based SIR-type model that simulates the infectionspread in a day care center [1, 2]. We could show that the infection spread is governed by various testingregimes and infection surveillance policies such as test frequency, quarantine policy, and specific test days.In the current study, we extend our model for other variants, test types and consider vaccination of individ-uals. Infection spread is modelled by a susceptible individual becoming infected with a specific infectionrate based on the current viral load of already infected individuals [5]. Thus, for each individual, the cor-responding temporal viral load kinetic needs to be simulated, which is done using a piecewise linear model[4]. Herefore, the underlying parameters are sampled from distributions established by using a linear mixedeffect model that was fitted to experimental data [3].With this model we are able to predict optimal surveillance strategies that are required to allow child carecenters to remain open during pandemic situations. It also allows the identification of common viral charac-teristics and how they affect the spread of infection, making it a valuable tool for other infectious diseases. References[1] Engels, G., Forster, J., Streng, A., Rücker, V., Rudolph, P., Pietsch, F., Wallstabe, J., Wallstabe, L.,Krauthausen, M., Schmidt, J., Ludwig, T., Bauer, C., Gierszewski, D., Bendig, J., Timme, S., Jans, T.,Weißbrich, B., Romanos, M., Dölken, L., Heuschmann, P., Härtel, C., Gágyor, I., Figge, M.T., Liese, J.,Kurzai, O. (2022). Acceptance of different self-sampling methods for semiweekly SARS-CoV-2 testing inasymptomatic children and childcare workers at German day care centers: a nonrandomized controlled trial.JAMA Network Open 5(9): e2231798. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/article-abstract/2796275[2] Forster, J., Streng, A., Rudolph, P., Rücker, V., Wallstabe, J., Timme, S., Pietsch, F., Hartmann, K., Krauthausen,M., Schmidt, J., Ludwig, T., Gierszewski, D., Jans, T., Engels, G., Weißbrich, B., Romanos, M., Dölken,L., Heuschmann, P., Härtel, C., Gágyor, I., Figge, M.T., Kurzai, O., Liese, J. (2022). Feasibility of SARS-CoV-2 surveillance testing among children and childcare workers at German day care centers: a nonrandom-ized controlled trial. JAMA Network Open 5(1): e2142057. https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/article-abstract/2787578[3] Jones, T.C., Biele, G., Mühlemann, B., Veith, T., Schneider, J., Beheim-Schwarzbach, J., Bleicker, T., Tesch, J.,Schmidt, M.L., Sander L.E., Kurth, F., Menzel, P., Schwarzer, R., Zuchowski, M., Hofmann, J., Krumbholz, A.,Stein, A., Edelmann, A., Corman, V.M., Drosten, C. (2021). Estimating infectiousness throughout SARS-CoV-2 infection course. Science 373(6551): eabi5273. https://www.science.org/doi/full/10.1126/science.abi5273[4] Larremore, D.B., Wilder, B., Lester, E., Shehata, S., Burke, J.M., Hay, J.A., Tambe, M., Mina, M.J., Parker,R. (2021). Test sensitivity is secondary to frequency and turnaround time for COVID-19 screening. Scienceadvances 7(1): 5393. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abd5393[5] Lelieveld, J., Helleis, F., Borrmann, S., Cheng, Y., Drewnick, F., Haug, G., Klimach, T., Sciare, J., Su, H.,Pöschl, U. (2020). Model Calculations of Aerosol Transmission and Infection Risk of COVID-19 in IndoorEnvironments. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health 17(21): 8114. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph17218114[6] Marchetti, D., Fontanesi, L., Di Giandomenico, S., Mazza, C., Roma, P., Verrocchio, M.C. (2020). The effectof parent psychological distress on child hyperactivity/inattention during the COVID-19 lockdown: Testingthe mediation of parent verbal hostility and child emotional symptoms. Frontiers in psychology 11: 567052.https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.567052