Risk Management and Healthcare Policy (Oct 2023)

Environmental Contamination of SARS-CoV-2 Delta VOC by COVID-19 Patients Staying in the Hospital for More Than Two Weeks

  • Ge J,
  • Zhang C,
  • Peng Z,
  • Chu M,
  • Chen W,
  • Li Z,
  • Liu S,
  • Yang Y,
  • Chu M

Journal volume & issue
Vol. Volume 16
pp. 2163 – 2170

Abstract

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Jingwu Ge,1,* Chuanmeng Zhang,2,* Zhihang Peng,3 Minjuan Chu,4 Wensen Chen,1 Zhanjie Li,1 Shuangyuan Liu,1 Yongfeng Yang,5 Ming Chu6 1Department of Infection Management, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, 210009, People’s Republic of China; 2The Center for Translational Medicine, The Affiliated Taizhou People’s Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Taizhou, 225300, People’s Republic of China; 3Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, Jiangsu, 211166, People’s Republic of China; 4Department of Critical Care Medicine, The First Affiliated Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, 210009, People’s Republic of China; 5Center of Infectious Diseases, Affiliated Nanjing Hospital of Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine (The No. 2 Hospital of Nanjing), Nanjing, 211113, People’s Republic of China; 6Department of Infection Management, The Affiliated Taizhou People’s Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Taizhou, 225300, People’s Republic of China*These authors contributed equally to this workCorrespondence: Ming Chu, Department of Infection Management, The Affiliated Taizhou People’s Hospital of Nanjing Medical University, Taizhou, 225300, People’s Republic of China, Email [email protected]: Patients infected with SARS-CoV-2 Delta VOC have a longer course of disease. We detected the air, surfaces, and patient’s personal items in the wards of the second hospital of Nanjing during the outbreak of the COVID-19 Delta Variant to identify the environmental contamination, which provides a theoretical basis for the prevention and control of COVID-19 variation beads in the future.Methods: In the cross-sectional study, we collected and analyzed clinical features, demographic and epidemiological data, laboratory and swab test results, and surface and air samples of 144 COVID-19 cases.Results: The time from symptom onset to surface sampling was 25 days (IQR, 21 to 33 days). Positive throat swabs were detected in 52(36.1%) patients, of which only 8(5.6%) patients had N or ORF1a/b genes Ct value < 35 on the surface sampling day. Among the 692 environmental surface and air specimens collected from 144 COVID-19 cases, 3 specimens (3/692, 0.4%) related to 5 cases (3.5%, 5/144) were detected positive on RT-PCR. Overall, bedside tables (2/144, 1.4%) were most likely to be contaminated, followed by toilet seats (1/81, 1.2%).Conclusion: The environmental contamination by SARS-CoV-2 Delta VOC-infected cases with disease duration of more than two weeks is limited.Keywords: COVID-19, delta VOC, environmental contamination, SARS-CoV-2

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