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. 2021 Feb 27;10(1):44.
doi: 10.1186/s13756-021-00912-z.

Systematic screening on admission for SARS-CoV-2 to detect asymptomatic infections

Rahel N Stadler  1 , Laura Maurer  1 , Lisandra Aguilar-Bultet  1 , Fabian Franzeck  1 , Chantal Ruchti  1 , Richard Kühl  1 , Andreas F Widmer  1 , Ruth Schindler  1 , Roland Bingisser  2 , Katharina M Rentsch  3 , Hans Pargger  4 , Raoul Sutter  4 , Luzius Steiner  5 , Christoph Meier  6 , Werner Kübler  6 , Hans H Hirsch  1   7   8 , Adrian Egli  9 , Manuel Battegay  1 , Stefano Bassetti  10 , Sarah Tschudin-Sutter  11   12
Affiliations

Systematic screening on admission for SARS-CoV-2 to detect asymptomatic infections

Rahel N Stadler et al. Antimicrob Resist Infect Control. .

Abstract

The proportion of asymptomatic carriers of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) remains elusive and the potential benefit of systematic screening during the SARS-CoV-2-pandemic is controversial. We investigated the proportion of asymptomatic inpatients who were identified by systematic screening for SARS-CoV-2 upon hospital admission. Our analysis revealed that systematic screening of asymptomatic inpatients detects a low total number of SARS-CoV-2 infections (0.1%), questioning the cost-benefit ratio of this intervention. Even when the population-wide prevalence was low, the proportion of asymptomatic carriers remained stable, supporting the need for universal infection prevention and control strategies to avoid onward transmission by undetected SARS-CoV-2-carriers during the pandemic.

Keywords: Asymptomatic carriers; COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; Screening.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no competing interests.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Results of SARS-CoV-2 screening samples from asymptomatic and symptomatic patients (overall and stratified by ward types)
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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