Temporary impact on medical system and effectiveness of mitigation strategies after COVID-19 policy adjustment in China: a modeling study
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- TL;DR
- This study models the impact of China's COVID-19 policy adjustments on the healthcare system and evaluates the effectiveness of various mitigation strategies.
- Problem
- Following the shift away from the "zero COVID" strategy, a sudden surge in infections threatened to overwhelm medical resources, creating an urgent need to quantify the disruption and evaluate specific mitigation measures.
- Method
- The researchers developed a stochastic compartmental model incorporating the Omicron variant's characteristics, population age structure, and vaccine effectiveness to project burdens on fever clinics and hospital beds, while estimating the effects of four-dose vaccinations, antipyretic supplies, non-pharmacological interventions, and triage treatment.
- Results
- The model projected 398.02 million fever clinic visits and 16.58 million hospitalizations, with healthcare disruption periods lasting 18 and 30 days respectively. While individual measures like antipyretic supplies and booster vaccines helped reduce pressure, combining strategies—specifically increasing heterologous booster rates for older adults to over 90% alongside expanded healthcare resources—was key to alleviating the bed burden.
- Contributions
- Not specified in the abstract.
- Limitations
- Not specified in the abstract.
- Takeaways
- The Omicron wave following China's late 2022 policy adjustment overloaded many local health systems, but combining vaccination, drug supply, triage, and public health measures can help prevent healthcare resources from being overwhelmed.
- Applications
- Not specified in the abstract.
- Topics
- Public health modeling, epidemiology, COVID-19 mitigation strategies
- For industry
- Healthcare and public health
- Why it matters
- Provides quantitative insights to help healthcare systems prepare for and mitigate disruptions during future epidemics.
Abstract
Background: As China amends its "zero COVID" strategy, a sudden increase in the number of infections may overwhelm medical resources and its impact has not been quantified. Specific mitigation strategies are needed to minimize disruption to the healthcare system and to prepare for the next possible epidemic in advance. Method: We develop a stochastic compartmental model to project the burden on the medical system (that is, the number of fever clinic visits and admission beds) of China after adjustment to COVID-19 policy, which considers the epidemiological characteristics of the Omicron variant, age composition of the population, and vaccine effectiveness against infection and severe COVD-19. We also estimate the effect of four-dose vaccinations (heterologous and homologous), antipyretic drug supply, non-pharmacological interventions (NPIs), and triage treatment on mitigating the domestic infection peak. Result: As to the impact on the medical system, this epidemic is projected to result in 398.02 million fever clinic visits and 16.58 million hospitalizations, and the disruption period on the healthcare system is 18 and 30 days, respectively. Antipyretic drug supply and booster vaccination could reduce the burden on emergency visits and hospitalization, respectively, while neither of them could not reduce to the current capacity. The synergy of several different strategies suggests that increasing the heterologous booster vaccination rate for older adult to over 90% is a key measure to alleviate the bed burden for respiratory diseases on the basis of expanded healthcare resource allocation. Conclusion: The Omicron epidemic followed the adjustment to COVID-19 policy overloading many local health systems across the country at the end of 2022. The combined effect of vaccination, antipyretic drug supply, triage treatment, and PHSMs could prevent overwhelming medical resources.