Most of the sick COVID-19 in hospitals have become infected with other patients, and not from medical workers this conclusion is stated by British researchers in their work in the magazine ELIFE.
Researchers studied data on the proliferation of coronavirus in the Addenbruck hospital in Cambridge during the first wave of Pandemic COVID-19 – from March to June 2020. Scientists paid attention to five branches where many people have become coronavirus in a short time – both patients and hospital staff.
With the help of smears, researchers have collected in infected genetic material of coronavirus. By combining the analysis of the genomic sequences of the virus, the chronology of infection and the location of patients at a particular moment, researchers using the algorithm developed by them managed to reconstruct the sequence of COVID-19 transmission cases. Scientists found that out of 22 cases of infection of patients in the hospital 20 were infected with other patients, and not by medical workers. Experts also revealed that the staff themselves were infected equally often from both patients and colleagues.
The results of the study once again emphasize the presence of “super-propriters” of coronavirus – 21 percent of patients caused 80 percent of cases of COVID-19 infection.