Marcos Amaku1,2, Dimas Tadeu Covas3, Francisco Antonio Bezerra Coutinho1, Raymundo Soares Azevedo1, Eduardo Massad4,5,6. 1. School of Medicine, University of Sao Paulo and LIM01-HCFMUSP, Sao Paulo, Brazil. 2. School of Veterinary Medicine, University of Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil. 3. Instituto Butantan, Sao Paulo, Brazil. 4. School of Medicine, University of Sao Paulo and LIM01-HCFMUSP, Sao Paulo, Brazil. eduardo.massad@fgv.br. 5. School of Applied Mathematics, Fundacao Getulio Vargas, Rua Praia de Botafogo 190, Rio de Janeiro, RJ, CEP 22250-900, Brazil. eduardo.massad@fgv.br. 6. London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, Keppel St., London, WC1E 7HT, UK. eduardo.massad@fgv.br.
Abstract
BACKGROUND: At the moment we have more than 177 million cases and 3.8 million deaths (as of June 2021) around the world and vaccination represents the only hope to control the pandemic. Imperfections in planning vaccine acquisition and difficulties in implementing distribution among the population, however, have hampered the control of the virus so far. METHODS: We propose a new mathematical model to estimate the impact of vaccination delay against the 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on the number of cases and deaths due to the disease in Brazil. We apply the model to Brazil as a whole and to the State of Sao Paulo, the most affected by COVID-19 in Brazil. We simulated the model for the populations of the State of Sao Paulo and Brazil as a whole, varying the scenarios related to vaccine efficacy and compliance from the populations. RESULTS: The model projects that, in the absence of vaccination, almost 170 thousand deaths and more than 350 thousand deaths will occur by the end of 2021 for Sao Paulo and Brazil, respectively. If in contrast, Sao Paulo and Brazil had enough vaccine supply and so started a vaccination campaign in January with the maximum vaccination rate, compliance and efficacy, they could have averted more than 112 thousand deaths and 127 thousand deaths, respectively. In addition, for each month of delay the number of deaths increases monotonically in a logarithmic fashion, for both the State of Sao Paulo and Brazil as a whole. CONCLUSIONS: Our model shows that the current delay in the vaccination schedules that is observed in many countries has serious consequences in terms of mortality by the disease and should serve as an alert to health authorities to speed the process up such that the highest number of people to be immunized is reached in the shortest period of time.
BACKGROUND: At the moment we have more than 177 million cases and 3.8 million deaths (as of June 2021) around the world and vaccination represents the only hope to control the pandemic. Imperfections in planning vaccine acquisition and difficulties in implementing distribution among the population, however, have hampered the control of the virus so far. METHODS: We propose a new mathematical model to estimate the impact of vaccination delay against the 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on the number of cases and deaths due to the disease in Brazil. We apply the model to Brazil as a whole and to the State of Sao Paulo, the most affected by COVID-19 in Brazil. We simulated the model for the populations of the State of Sao Paulo and Brazil as a whole, varying the scenarios related to vaccine efficacy and compliance from the populations. RESULTS: The model projects that, in the absence of vaccination, almost 170 thousand deaths and more than 350 thousand deaths will occur by the end of 2021 for Sao Paulo and Brazil, respectively. If in contrast, Sao Paulo and Brazil had enough vaccine supply and so started a vaccination campaign in January with the maximum vaccination rate, compliance and efficacy, they could have averted more than 112 thousand deaths and 127 thousand deaths, respectively. In addition, for each month of delay the number of deaths increases monotonically in a logarithmic fashion, for both the State of Sao Paulo and Brazil as a whole. CONCLUSIONS: Our model shows that the current delay in the vaccination schedules that is observed in many countries has serious consequences in terms of mortality by the disease and should serve as an alert to health authorities to speed the process up such that the highest number of people to be immunized is reached in the shortest period of time.
Authors: Luděk Berec; René Levínský; Jakub Weiner; Martin Šmíd; Roman Neruda; Petra Vidnerová; Gabriela Suchopárová Journal: Sci Rep Date: 2022-05-10 Impact factor: 4.996