Time Course of COVID-19 Pandemic in Algeria: Retrospective Estimate of the Actual Burden
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Mohamed Hamidouche 1 2 * , Nassira Belmessabih 1 3
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1 Pasteur Institute of Algeria, ALGERIA
2 Public Health School of Pasteur-CNAM of Paris, FRANCE
3 University of Montreal, CANADA
* Corresponding Author

Abstract

Since December 2019, the world has been incrementally invaded by SARS-CoV-2. Algeria is affected since February 25, 2020. In order to benefit from its experience, this study aims to describe the epidemic’s current situation and then retrospectively estimate its real burden.
First, we described the epidemic’s indicators as; cases, deaths, and we computed the R0 evolution. Secondly, we used the New York City cases-fatality rate standardized by Algerian age structure, to retrospectively estimate the actual burden.
The reported cases are in a clear diminution, but, the epidemic epicentre is moving from Blida to other cities. We noted a clear peak in daily cases-fatality from March 30, to April 17, 2020, due to underestimating the actual infections of the first 25 days. Since May 8, 2020, the daily R0 is around one. Moreover, we noticed 31% reduction of its mean value from 1,41 to 0,97 between the last two months. The Algerian Age-Standardized Infection Fatality Rate we found is 0,88%. Based on that, we demonstrated that only 1,5% of actual infections were detected and reported before March 30, and 20% after March 31. Therefore, the actual infections burden is currently five times higher than reported. At the end, we found that at least 0,2 % of the population have been infected until May 27.
The under estimation of the epidemic’s actual burden is probably due to the lack of testing capacities, however, all the indicators show that the situation is currently controlled.

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This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Original Article

https://doi.org/10.30935/jconseph/8440

J CONTEMP STUD EPIDEMIOL PUBLIC HEALTH, 2020 - Volume 1 Issue 1, Article No: ep20001

Publication date: 30 Jul 2020

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