Preparing Correctional Settings for the Next Pandemic: a Modeling Study of COVID-19 Outbreaks in Two High-income Countries

Overview

Journal Front Public Health

Specialty Public Health

Date 2024 Apr 1

PMID 38560445

Authors

Jisoo A Kwon

Neil A Bretana

Nadine Kronfli

Camille Dussault

Luke Grant

Jennifer Galouzis

Wendy Hoey

James Blogg

Andrew R Lloyd

Richard T Gray

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Introduction: Correctional facilities are high-priority settings for coordinated public health responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. These facilities are at high risk of disease transmission due to close contacts between people in prison and with the wider community. People in prison are also vulnerable to severe disease given their high burden of co-morbidities.

Methods: We developed a mathematical model to evaluate the effect of various public health interventions, including vaccination, on the mitigation of COVID-19 outbreaks, applying it to prisons in Australia and Canada.

Results: We found that, in the absence of any intervention, an outbreak would occur and infect almost 100% of people in prison within 20 days of the index case. However, the rapid rollout of vaccines with other non-pharmaceutical interventions would almost eliminate the risk of an outbreak.

Discussion: Our study highlights that high vaccination coverage is required for variants with high transmission probability to completely mitigate the outbreak risk in prisons.

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