A two-phase stochastic dynamic model for COVID-19 mid-term policy recommendations in Greece: a pathway towards mass vaccination

Rachaniotis, N. P.; Dasaklis, T. K.; Fotopoulos, F.; Tinios, P.

From November 7th, 2020, Greece adopted a second nationwide lockdown policy to mitigate the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 (the first took place from March 23rd till May 4th, 2020), just as the second wave of COVID-19 was advancing, as did other European countries. In the light of the very promising voluntary mass vaccination, which will start in January 2021, it is of utmost importance for the country to plan to complement vaccination with mid-term Non-Pharmaceutical Interventions (NPIs). The objective is to minimize human losses and to limit social and economic costs. In this paper a two-phase stochastic dynamic network compartmental model (a pre-vaccination SEIR until February 15th, 2021 and a post-vaccination SVEIR from February 15th, 2021 to June 30th, 2021) is developed. Three scenarios are assessed in the first phase: (a) a baseline scenario, which lifts the national lockdown and all NPIs on January 2021, (b) a 'semi-lockdown' scenario with school opening, partial retail sector operation, universal mask wearing and social distancing/teleworking on January 2021 and (c) a 'rolling lockdown' scenario combining a partial lifting of measures in January 2021 followed by a third imposed nationwide lockdown in February 2021. In the second phase three scenarios with different vaccination rates are assessed. Publicly available data along with some preliminary first results of the SHARE COVID-19 survey conducted in Greece are used as input. The results regarding the first phase indicate that the 'semi-lockdown' scenario outperforms the third lockdown scenario (5.7% less expected fatalities), whereas in the second phase it is of great importance to ensure a sufficient vaccine supply and high vaccination rates.