Effect of Non-lockdown Social Distancing and Testing-Contact Tracing During a COVID-19 Outbreak in Daegu, South Korea, February to April 2020: A Modeling Study

Chen, Yi-Hsuan; Fang, Chi-Tai; Huang, Yu-Ling

OBJECTIVE: In Spring 2020, South Korea applied non-lockdown social distancing (avoiding mass gathering and non-essential social engagement, without restricting movement of people who were not patients or contacts), testing-and-isolation (testing), and tracing-and-quarantine the contacts (contact tracing), to successfully control the first large-scale COVID-19 outbreak outside China. However, the relative contributions of these two interventions remain uncertain. METHODS: We constructed an SEIR model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission (disproportionately through superspreading events), and fit the model to outbreak data in Daegu, South Korea, February to April 2020. We assessed effect of non-lockdown social distancing (population-wide control measures) and/or testing-contact tracing (individual-specific control measures), alone or combined, in term of basic reproductive number (R0) and the trajectory of epidemic. RESULTS: The point estimate for baseline R0, is 3.6 (sensitivity analyses range: 2.3 to 5.6). Combined interventions of non-lockdown social distancing and testing-contact tracing can suppress R0 to less than 1, and rapidly contain the epidemic, even under the worst scenario with a high baseline R0 of 5.6. In contrast, either intervention alone will fail to suppress R0. Non-lockdown social distancing alone just postpones the peak of the epidemic, while testing-contact tracing alone only flattens the curve but does not contain the outbreak. CONCLUSIONS: To successfully control a large-scale COVID-19 outbreak, both non-lockdown social distancing and testing-contact tracing must be implemented. The two interventions are synergistic.