Food-trade-associated COVID-19 outbreak from a contaminated wholesale food supermarket in Beijing

Shan Lu; Weijia Wang; Yanpeng Cheng; Caixin Yang; Yifan Jiao; Mingchao Xu; Yibo Bai; Jing Yang; Hongbin Song; Ligui Wang; Jiaojiao Wang; Bing Rong; Jianguo Xu

Journal of Biosafety and Biosecurity (Jun 2021)

Food-trade-associated COVID-19 outbreak from a contaminated wholesale food supermarket in Beijing

Shan Lu,
Weijia Wang,
Yanpeng Cheng,
Caixin Yang,
Yifan Jiao,
Mingchao Xu,
Yibo Bai,
Jing Yang,
Hongbin Song,
Ligui Wang,
Jiaojiao Wang,
Bing Rong,
Jianguo Xu

Affiliations

Shan Lu: State Key Laboratory of Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, PR China; Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center, Shanghai Institute for Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases, Shanghai, PR China; Research Units of Discovery of Unknown Bacteria and Function, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing, PR China
Weijia Wang: University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA
Yanpeng Cheng: Scholl of Public Health, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, PR China
Caixin Yang: Scholl of Public Health, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, PR China
Yifan Jiao: Scholl of Public Health, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, PR China
Mingchao Xu: Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics, School of Public Health, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, PR China
Yibo Bai: Scholl of Public Health, Shanxi Medical University, Taiyuan, Shanxi Province, PR China
Jing Yang: State Key Laboratory of Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, PR China; Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center, Shanghai Institute for Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases, Shanghai, PR China; Research Units of Discovery of Unknown Bacteria and Function, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing, PR China
Hongbin Song: Center for Disease Control and Prevention of Chinese People’s Liberation Army, Fengtai District, Beijing, PR China
Ligui Wang: Center for Disease Control and Prevention of Chinese People’s Liberation Army, Fengtai District, Beijing, PR China
Jiaojiao Wang: The State Key Laboratory of Management and Control for Complex Systems, Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, PR China
Bing Rong: Department of Epidemiology, Center for Global Health, School of Public Health, Nanjing Medical University, Nanjing, PR China
Jianguo Xu: State Key Laboratory of Infectious Disease Prevention and Control, Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, National Institute for Communicable Disease Control and Prevention, Beijing, PR China; Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center, Shanghai Institute for Emerging and Re-emerging Infectious Diseases, Shanghai, PR China; Research Units of Discovery of Unknown Bacteria and Function, Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, Beijing, PR China; Institute of Public Health, Nankai University, Tianjing, PR China; Corresponding author at Institute of Public Health, Nankai University, Tianjing, PR China.

Journal volume & issue: Vol. 3, no. 1
pp. 58 – 65

Abstract

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The re-emerging outbreak of COVID-19 in Beijing, China, in the summer of 2020 originated from a SARS-CoV-2-infested wholesale food supermarket. We postulated that the Xinfadi market outbreak has links with food-trade activities. Our Susceptible to the disease, Infectious, and Recovered coupled Agent Based Modelling (SIR-ABM) analysis for studying the diffusion of SARS-CoV-2 particles suggested that the trade-distancing strategy effectively reduces the reproduction number (R0). The retail shop closure strategy reduced the number of visitors to the market by nearly half. In addition, the buy-local policy option reduced the infection by more than 70% in total. Therefore, retail closures and buy-local policies could serve as significantly effective strategies that have the potential to reduce the size of the outbreak and prevent probable outbreaks in the future.

Published in Journal of Biosafety and Biosecurity

ISSN: 2588-9338 (Online)
Publisher: KeAi Communications Co., Ltd.
Country of publisher: China
LCC subjects: Science: Biology (General)
Website: https://www.keaipublishing.com/en/journals/journal-of-biosafety-and-biosecurity/

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