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Observational Study
. 2022 Aug 25;17(8):e0273482.
doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0273482. eCollection 2022.

SARS-CoV-2 infections in infants in Haiti 2020-2021; evidence from a seroepidemiological cohort

Rigan Louis  1   2 , Ruiyu Pu  1   3 , Tracey D Logan  1   3 , Luke Trimmer-Smith  3 , Richard Chamblain  1   2 , Adriana Gallagher  1   3 , Valery Madsen Beau De Rochars  1   4 , Eric Nelson  1   5   6 , Derek A T Cummings  1   7 , Maureen T Long  1   3 , J Glenn Morris Jr  1   8
Affiliations
Observational Study

SARS-CoV-2 infections in infants in Haiti 2020-2021; evidence from a seroepidemiological cohort

Rigan Louis et al. PLoS One. .

Abstract

Few data are available on frequency of SARS-CoV-2 infection among very young children in low- to middle-income countries (LMIC), with the studies that are available biased towards higher income countries with low reported infection and seroconversion rates. Between February 2019 and March 2021, 388 dried blood spot (DBS) samples were obtained from 257 children less than 30 months of age as part of a prospective observational cohort study of pregnant women and their infants in Haiti; longitudinal samples were available for 107 children. In a subsequent retrospective analysis, DBS samples were tested by ELISA for antibody targeting the receptor binding domain of the SARS-CoV-2 S1 protein. Over the course of the study, 16·7% of the infants became seropositive. All seropositive samples were collected after March 19, 2020 (the date of the first reported COVID-19 case in Haiti) with the highest hazards measured in August 2020. Sampling date was the only covariate associated with the hazard of seroconversion. Our data provide an estimate of SARS-CoV-2 infection rates among very young children without prior SARS-CoV-2 exposure during the initial pandemic waves in Haiti, and demonstrate that these children mount a detectable serological response which is independent of patient age.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Figures

Fig 1
Fig 1
Reported cases (blue) and deaths (red) due to SARS-CoV-2 in Haiti (top) and optical density from ELISA that measures the antibody to SARS-CoV-2 Receptor Binding Domain IgG (bottom) by date of sampling for Haitian infants born between March 2019 and May 2021 and followed for up to 30 mos.
Fig 2
Fig 2. Times of follow up for each infant with serostatus indicated from 2019 to 2021.
Seropositive samples are shown in red and the seronegative are without fill. Lines connect samples from the same infant.
Fig 3
Fig 3. Kaplan Meier survival plot showing estimated probabilities of individuals in our cohort remaining seronegative.
Estimates account for interval censoring in data.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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