China CDC and Oxford University Joint Report: New Crown Epidemic Prevention and Control Brings an Unexpected Impact
As of February 26, the new crown pneumonia epidemic has caused more than 2.5 million deaths worldwide.
In previous studies of infectious diseases, in addition to the direct impact of pathogens on the human body, the effects of other systemic diseases induced by infection and the deterioration of basic diseases cannot be ignored.
In short: through research, humans can have a deeper understanding of the dangers of infectious diseases.
On February 24, the British Medical Journal published China’s first systematic analysis of excess deaths throughout the country during the outbreak of the new crown epidemic. It was organized by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Hubei Provincial Center for Disease Control and Prevention, Wuhan Center for Disease Control and Prevention, and Oxford, UK. Jointly carried out by university researchers.
The team analyzed data from China's official death registration reporting system from January 1 to March 31, 2020, and compared it with the data of the same period in the past five years, with a view to formulating relevant prevention and control measures and vaccination for governments Strategy provides reference.
Through research, the team discovered an unexpected effect: the restrictive epidemic prevention measures adopted across the country not only successfully contained the spread of the epidemic, but also caused a certain degree of mortality in many places outside Wuhan in the first three months of last year. Decline.
How did the research discover unexpected effects?
Chen Zhengming, one of the corresponding authors of the paper and a professor of epidemiology at the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom, said: “Research shows that the ban on foot during the outbreak and changes in people’s behavior, such as wearing masks, washing hands frequently, social distancing and restricting travel, are not only effective In addition to reducing the spread of the new coronavirus, there are actually other unexpected health benefits."
The research analyzed data from Wuhan and other regions.
The new crown epidemic in Wuhan was serious at that time, and it is not difficult to imagine that the number of deaths due to new crown pneumonia will increase.
However, the data outside Wuhan showed unexpected results-
The actual mortality rate outside Wuhan is lower than the expected value based on previous data modeling (675 vs. 715 per 100,000 people).
Breakdown studies show that the reduction is mainly due to the decline in deaths caused by other diseases, including other pneumonia other than the new crown, which has dropped by 47%, chronic respiratory diseases have dropped by 18%, and even the proportion of deaths due to traffic accidents has dropped from the estimated value by 23 %……
According to reports, the data used in this study comes from the death report records of the National Disease Surveillance Point (DSP) system under the charge of the China Center for Disease Control and Prevention. It covers more than 300 million people in 605 urban areas and rural counties, accounting for more than 300 million people in China’s total population. More than 20%.
Industry scholars said that the time trend of the decline in deaths from diseases outside Wuhan is closely related to the development of the epidemic and the implementation of prevention and control measures.
Studies have shown that during the implementation of epidemic prevention and control measures in various regions, not only the new crown epidemic was quickly and effectively controlled, but the medical systems in all regions (except Wuhan) were also operating normally, effectively avoiding possible secondary harm caused by running on the medical system.
This large-scale study provides important evidence, and data analysis further demonstrates the need for rapid, severe and unified actions during major infectious disease outbreaks. Only in this way can the spread be effectively contained and eliminated and the harmful effects of the epidemic on people’s health can be minimized. .
What is the biggest difficulty in research?
The death cause monitoring system in my country covers 605 counties and districts across the country, and about 2 million people die each year. Every death includes death cause data and analysis data. After years of monitoring and accumulation, the volume of data is huge.
The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) team has many years of experience in death cause monitoring and data analysis.
After the research team has cleaned up the data of the past five years, it has established a model to estimate the number of excess deaths by referring to the methods of international studies on excess deaths.
The biggest difficulty is to get the model closest to reality.
It is understood that the analysis work of the research team started in April 2020. According to the routine death cause monitoring work, the reporting of death data from January to March may be delayed to a certain extent, and because many grassroots CDCs are responsible for the monitoring of the cause of death Personnel are also transferred to the epidemic prevention and control work. Under such circumstances, how to accurately quantify the late data reporting in 2020 based on historical data is a very big challenge.
According to the regularity existing in previous years and the unique situation in 2020, the researchers learned about the situation with the staff of the CDC at the grassroots level, especially the exchanges with relevant experts from Hubei Province and Wuhan CDC to discuss data correction methods. It is close to the real situation of death in 2020.
Research is used to measure the harm of infectious diseases
Based on the foundation of past scientific research cooperation, the CDC team and the University of Oxford have been paying attention to the impact on the health of the entire population in the early stages of the outbreak. The data analysis work is mainly completed by the CDC team, and Oxford University starts from an international perspective. , And gave many valuable suggestions on article writing and result interpretation.
The study of excess mortality generally studies the severity and health damage of certain infectious diseases.
Previous studies have mostly focused on the analysis of excess deaths from influenza to analyze the deaths caused by other systemic diseases and the deterioration of underlying diseases in addition to deaths due to influenza or pneumonia during influenza epidemic seasons in different years.
Relevant scholars said that the study of excess deaths not only understands the direct deaths caused by different infectious disease outbreaks, but also causes deaths, as a whole to understand the severity and overall health damage caused, and is useful for formulating relevant prevention and control measures and vaccination strategies. It is of great significance.