Accepted for/Published in: JMIR Public Health and Surveillance
Date Submitted: Oct 11, 2022
Open Peer Review Period: Sep 13, 2022 - Sep 27, 2022
Date Accepted: Feb 14, 2023
(closed for review but you can still tweet)
COVID-19 contact tracing strategies during the first wave of epidemic: a systematic review of published studies
ABSTRACT
Background:
Contact tracing (CT) represented one of the core activities for the prevention and control of COVID-19 in the early phase of the pandemic. Available evidence suggests marked differences in the organizational models of CT adopted in different settings.
Objective:
We aimed to provide a comprehensive picture of the organizational aspects of CT activities, through the systematic identification and description of CT strategies used in different settings.
Methods:
A systematic review of published studies describing organizational models of CT strategies for the surveillance and control of SARS-CoV-2 infection was conducted in accordance with the PRISMA (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses) statement.
Results:
We retrieved a total of 1,637 studies, 18 of which were included in the narrative synthesis. Seven studies target the general population, 11 studies described CT activities carried out in specific population subgroups. Our review identified some common elements across implemented CT strategies, which include the following: decentralization of CT activities, involvement of trained non-public health resources (e.g. University students, civil servants), use of digital tools for CT management, inter-agency collaboration, adoption of strategies to increase community engagement. CT strategies implemented in the workplace envisaged a strong collaboration with Occupational Health Services, both in the healthcare and in other work settings. Outreach activities showed to increase CT efficiency in vulnerable groups, such as ethnic minorities or people experiencing homelessness (PEH). Data on the effectiveness of CT strategies are scarce, with only few studies reporting on key performance indicators.
Conclusions:
Despite the lack of data on effectiveness, our findings can provide some indication for future planning and development of CT strategies for infectious disease control, mainly in terms of coordination, use of human and technical resources. Further research on the organizational models of CT strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic would be needed to contribute to a more robust evidence-making process.
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