Evaluating the risk of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection with the Omicron or Delta variant in Wales, UK

Postans, Mark, Pacchiarini, Nicole ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5383-6053, Song, Jiao, Cottrell, Simon, Williams, Catie, Beazer, Andrew, Moore, Catherine, Connor, Thomas R. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2394-6504 and Williams, Christopher 2024. Evaluating the risk of SARS-CoV-2 reinfection with the Omicron or Delta variant in Wales, UK. PLoS ONE 19 (9) , e0309645. 10.1371/journal.pone.0309645

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Abstract

Recent studies suggest an increased risk of reinfection with the SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant compared with previous variants, potentially due to an increased ability to escape immunity specific to older variants, high antigenic divergence of Omicron from earlier virus variants as well as its altered cell entry pathway. The present study sought to investigate epidemiological evidence for differential SARS-CoV-2 reinfection intervals and incidence rates for the Delta versus Omicron variants within Wales. Reinfections in Wales up to February 2022 were defined using genotyping and whole genome sequencing. The median inter-infection intervals for Delta and Omicron were 226 and 192 days, respectively. An incidence rate ratio of 2.17 for reinfection with Omicron compared to Delta was estimated using a conditional Poisson model, which accounted for several factors including sample collection date, age group, area of residence, vaccination and travel status. These findings are consistent with an increased risk of reinfection with the Omicron variant, and highlight the value of monitoring emerging variants that have the potential for causing further waves of cases.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Published Online
Status:	Published
Schools:	Psychology Medicine Biosciences
Additional Information:	License information from Publisher: LICENSE 1: URL: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Publisher:	Public Library of Science
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	9 September 2024
Date of Acceptance:	16 August 2024
Last Modified:	09 Sep 2024 10:30
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/171936

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