In Tirschenreuth, the German district hit hardest by the Covid-19 pandemic, the number of unreported SARS-CoV-2 infections in the first half of 2020 was 80 percent, according to a study by the University Hospital Regensburg and the University Hospital Erlangen. The study, called “Prospective COVID-19 Cohort Tirschenreuth” (TiKoCo19), was commissioned by the Bavarian State Ministry of Science and Art to investigate the pandemic. Tirschenreuth had over 1,500 registered SARS-CoV-2 infections per 100,000 inhabitants in the fall of 2020, making it the most affected district in Germany. The study’s preliminary results, published on the preprint server medRxiv, show that in the first half of 2020, for every person who knew they were infected, there were four others who were infected but unaware of it.
The study found that the highest number of unreported infections, at 92 percent, was in the age group of 14 to 20-year-olds, while the number was significantly lower, at 41 percent, for people over 85 years old. Overall, the researchers estimated that 8.6 percent of the population in Tirschenreuth had been infected with SARS-CoV-2 by June 2020, and 2.5 percent of those infected had died from or with Covid-19 between February and June 2020. The study also showed that the mortality rate was influenced by both age and care situation, with only 0.5 percent of deaths occurring in people under 60 years old, while 14 percent of deaths were in the 70 to 79-year-old age group, and 45 percent of deaths occurred in nursing homes.
The study’s findings support the current government strategy of prioritizing vaccination for people over 70 years old and healthcare workers, while also including testing for teenagers, whose number of unreported infections is particularly high. The researchers concluded that both care situation and age influence the mortality rate in Covid-19 infections. These results provide valuable insights into the impact of the pandemic on different age groups and care situations, and can help inform future public health policies.
