Morbidity of SARS-CoV-2 in the Evolution to Endemicity and in Comparison with Influenza

Overview

Journal Commun Med (Lond)

Publisher Nature Portfolio

Specialty General Medicine

Date 2024 Nov 23

PMID 39578575

Authors

Istvan Bartha

Cyrus Maher

Victor Lavrenko

Yi-Pei Chen

Qiqing Tao

Julia di Iulio

Keith Boundy

Elizabeth Kinter

Wendy Yeh

Davide Corti

Amalio Telenti

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Background: There are three possible SARS-CoV-2 post-pandemic scenarios: (i) ongoing severity, (ii) influenza-like severity, and (iii) a transition to an endemic disease with lesser morbidity similar to that of other human coronaviruses.

Methods: To assess a possible evolution of the pandemic under the three scenarios, we use data from the US National Covid Cohort Collaborative, CDC COVID-NET, and CDC Fluview and from the WastewaterSCAN Dashboard. We include influenza disease and treatment response as benchmark. The US National Covid Cohort Collaborative allows the quantification of viral-specific morbidity using electronic health records from 424,165 SARS-CoV-2 cases, 53,846 influenza cases, and 199,971 uninfected control subjects from 2021-2022. Evolution of hospitalization rates is estimated from the correlation between national SARS-CoV-2 and influenza hospitalization data and viral gene copies in wastewater.

Results: Our findings reveal that medically attended SARS-CoV-2 infections exhibit similar morbidity to influenza [indicative of scenario (ii)], but SARS-CoV-2 hospitalization rates are one order of magnitude lower than influenza when considering virus concentration in wastewater [indicative of scenario (iii)]. Moreover, SARS-CoV-2 displays a more favorable response to antiviral therapy.

Conclusions: Our analysis confirms a rapid decline in SARS-CoV-2 morbidity as it transitions to an endemic state.

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