A population-based controlled experiment assessing the epidemiological impact of digital contact tracing

Rodríguez, Pablo, Graña, Santiago, Alvarez-León, Eva Elisa, Battaglini, Manuela, Darias, Francisco Javier, Hernán, Miguel A., López, Raquel, Llaneza, Paloma, Martín, Maria Cristina, Ramirez-Rubio, Oriana, Romaní, Adriana, Suárez-Rodríguez, Berta, Sanchez Monedero, Javier, Arenas, Alex and Lacasa, Lucas 2021. A population-based controlled experiment assessing the epidemiological impact of digital contact tracing. Nature Communications 12 (1) , 587. 10.1038/s41467-020-20817-6

PDF - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (620kB)

Abstract

While Digital contact tracing (DCT) has been argued to be a valuable complement to manual tracing in the containment of COVID-19, no empirical evidence of its effectiveness is available to date. Here, we report the results of a 4-week population-based controlled experiment that took place in La Gomera (Canary Islands, Spain) between June and July 2020, where we assessed the epidemiological impact of the Spanish DCT app Radar Covid. After a substantial communication campaign, we estimate that at least 33% of the population adopted the technology and further showed relatively high adherence and compliance as well as a quick turnaround time. The app detects about 6.3 close-contacts per primary simulated infection, a significant percentage being contacts with strangers, although the spontaneous follow-up rate of these notified cases is low. Overall, these results provide experimental evidence of the potential usefulness of DCT during an epidemic outbreak in a real population.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Journalism, Media and Culture
Publisher:	Nature Research
ISSN:	2041-1723
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	24 August 2021
Date of Acceptance:	8 December 2020
Last Modified:	15 May 2023 23:47
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/143463

Citation Data

Cited 49 times in Scopus. View in Scopus. Powered By Scopus® Data

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item