Estimating the infection and case fatality ratio for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) using age-adjusted data from the outbreak on the Diamond Princess cruise ship, February 2020

Euro Surveill. 2020 Mar;25(12):2000256. doi: 10.2807/1560-7917.ES.2020.25.12.2000256.

Abstract

Adjusting for delay from confirmation to death, we estimated case and infection fatality ratios (CFR, IFR) for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) on the Diamond Princess ship as 2.6% (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.89-6.7) and 1.3% (95% CI: 0.38-3.6), respectively. Comparing deaths on board with expected deaths based on naive CFR estimates from China, we estimated CFR and IFR in China to be 1.2% (95% CI: 0.3-2.7) and 0.6% (95% CI: 0.2-1.3), respectively.

Keywords: COVID-19; Case fatality ratio; asymptomatic; coronavirus; cruise ship; infection fatality ratio; outbreak; severity.

MeSH terms

  • Adolescent
  • Adult
  • Aged
  • Betacoronavirus
  • COVID-19
  • COVID-19 Testing
  • Child
  • Child, Preschool
  • Clinical Laboratory Techniques / methods*
  • Contact Tracing
  • Coronavirus / genetics
  • Coronavirus / isolation & purification*
  • Coronavirus Infections / diagnosis
  • Coronavirus Infections / mortality*
  • Coronavirus Infections / transmission
  • Disease Outbreaks / prevention & control*
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Infant
  • Infant, Newborn
  • Male
  • Middle Aged
  • Mortality
  • Pandemics
  • Pneumonia, Viral / diagnosis
  • Pneumonia, Viral / mortality*
  • Pneumonia, Viral / transmission
  • Point-of-Care Systems
  • Polymerase Chain Reaction
  • Risk Factors
  • SARS-CoV-2
  • Ships*
  • Travel*
  • Young Adult