Confirmed and Unreported COVID-19-Like Illness Death Counts: An Assessment of Reporting Discrepancy

Ahamad, Mazbahul G.; Tanin, Fahian; Talukder, Byomkesh

doi:10.1101/2020.07.20.20158139

Cited by 5 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…It is possible that the high early volume of Google search terms in March and April was l driven by panic searches spurred by news of a new global pandemic. In subsequent months, internet searches regarding COVID-19 may have decreased as a result of reports of a significantly lower COVID-19 death rate in Bangladesh than the United States and other countries [11].…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Search Interests related to COVID-19: Insights from Google Search Trends in Bangladesh

Ahamad

Ahmed

Uden

2021

Preprint

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ObjectivePublic response monitoring is critical to reducing COVID-19 infections and developing effective public health strategies. This study explored Google search trends to understand public responses to COVID-19 concerns in Bangladesh.MethodsWe used country-level Google search trends data to examine the association between Google search terms related to COVID-19 deaths, face masks, and COVID-19 vaccines and the actual and one-week lagged actual COVID-19 death counts from February 2, 2020, to December 19, 2020, in Bangladesh. Results: Search terms related to COVID-19 deaths, face masks, and COVID-19 vaccines increased and peaked during March and April, but then began declining gradually after June 2020. The mean relative search volume for face masks (35 points) was higher than for death information (8 points) and vaccines (16 points) throughout the study period, and searching for masks peaked (100 points) during the third week of March. Search interests for death information and face masks were negatively correlated with the actual and one-week lagged actual COVID-19 death counts.ConclusionIn response to declining trends in COVID-19-related google search terms, policymakers should strengthen ongoing risk communication and preventive information dissemination programs to control and prevent COVID-19 cases and deaths.

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Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Public Search Interests related to COVID-19: Insights from Google Search Trends in Bangladesh

Ahamad

Ahmed

Uden

2021

Preprint

Self Cite

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“…The reason is that during an epidemic, crude CFR estimation becomes an underestimate of the actual CFR [ 5 ]. However, there are unreported cases because of both limited tests and asymptomatic or mild patients [ [40] , [41] , [42] , [43] ]. Therefore, after further adjustment for reporting rates lower than 50%, estimated CFRs became less than one-third compared to crude CFR, and survival interval adjusted CFR.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Finding the real COVID-19 case-fatality rates for SAARC countries

Shah

Ahammed

Anjum

et al. 2021

Biosafety and Health

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The crude case fatality rate (CFR), because of the calculation method, is the most accurate when the pandemic is over since there is a possibility of the delay between disease onset and outcome. Adjusted crude CFR measures can better explain the pandemic situation by improving the CFR estimation. However, no study has thoroughly investigated the COVID-19 adjusted CFR of the SAARC countries. This study estimated both survival interval and underreporting adjusted CFR of COVID-19 for these countries. Moreover, we assessed the crude CFR between genders and across age groups and observed the CFR changes due to the imposition of fees on COVID-19 tests in Bangladesh. Using the daily records up to October 9, we implemented a statistical method to remove the delay between disease onset and outcome bias, and due to asymptomatic or mild symptomatic cases, reporting rates lower than 50% (95% CI: 10%–50%) bias in crude CFR. We found that Afghanistan had the highest CFR, followed by Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Maldives, and Sri Lanka. Our estimated crude CFR varied from 3.708% to 0.290%, survival interval adjusted CFR varied from 3.767% to 0.296% and further underreporting adjusted CFR varied from 1.096% to 0.083%. Furthermore, the crude CFRs for men were significantly higher than that of women in Afghanistan (4.034% vs. 2.992%) and Bangladesh (1.739% vs. 1.337%) whereas the opposite was observed in Maldives (0.284% vs. 0.390%), Nepal (0.006% vs. 0.007%), and Pakistan (2.057% vs. 2.080%). Besides, older age groups had higher risks of death. Moreover, crude CFR increased from 1.261% to 1.572% after imposing the COVID-19 test fees in Bangladesh. Therefore, the authorities of countries with higher CFR should be looking for strategic counsel from the countries with lower CFR to equip themselves with the necessary knowledge to combat the pandemic. Moreover, caution is needed to report the CFR.

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“…The reason is that during an epidemic crude CFR estimation becomes an underestimate of the actual CFR [5]. However, because of both limited numbers of test and presence of asymptotic or mild cases, there exists unreported cases [25][26][27][28]. Therefore, after further adjustment for reporting rates lower than 50%, estimated CFRs became less than one-third compared to crude CFR, and survival interval adjusted CFR.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Finding the real COVID-19 case-fatality rates for SAARC countries

Shah¹,

Ahammed

Anjum³

et al. 2020

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Crude case fatality rate (CFR) is the most accurate when the pandemic is over. Adjustments to the crude CFR measure can better explain the pandemic situation by improving the CFR estimation. However, no study has thoroughly investigated COVID-19 adjusted CFR of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) countries. In this study, we estimated both survival interval and underreporting adjusted CFR of COVID-19 for the SAARC countries and observed the CFR changes due to the imposition of fees on COVID-19 tests in Bangladesh. Using the daily records up to 9th October, we implemented a statistical method to remove both the bias in crude CFR, i.e., the delay between disease onset and outcome bias and due to asymptomatic or mild symptomatic cases, reporting rates lower than 50% (95% CI: 10%-50%) bias. According to our findings, Afghanistan had the highest CFR, followed by Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Maldives, and Sri Lanka. Our estimated crude CFR varied from 3.71% to 0.29%, survival interval adjusted CFR varied from 3.77% to 0.3% and further underreporting adjusted CFR varied from 1.1% to 0.08%. We have also found that crude CFR increased from 1.261% to 1.572% after imposing the COVID-19 test fees in Bangladesh. Therefore, the authorities of countries with higher CFR should be looking for strategic counsel from the countries with lower CFR to equip themselves with the necessary knowledge to combat the pandemic. Moreover, caution is needed to report the CFR.

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Confirmed and Unreported COVID-19-Like Illness Death Counts: An Assessment of Reporting Discrepancy

Cited by 5 publications

References 3 publications

Public Search Interests related to COVID-19: Insights from Google Search Trends in Bangladesh

Public Search Interests related to COVID-19: Insights from Google Search Trends in Bangladesh

Finding the real COVID-19 case-fatality rates for SAARC countries

Finding the real COVID-19 case-fatality rates for SAARC countries

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