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A new study published in the journal Nature estimates that 83 millions of Americans, or the 31% of the United States population had been infected with the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus at the end of 2020 , the year in which broke out the crisis due to the global coronavirus pandemic
The study by researchers from Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health published Thursday in the journal Nature, explains that they modeled the spread of the disease caused by the coronavirus , finding that less than a quarter of infections (22%) were accounted for in confirmed cases, through evidence-based public health reports.
This study is the first to comprehensively quantify the global burden and characteristics of the covid – 19 in the year 2020.
The researchers simulated the transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus within and between the 3, 142 counties in the country using population data, mobility and confirmed cases.
The study also revealed that Covid infections – 19 had spread more in certain areas of the country, such as the northern Midwest, in Mississippi, the Dakotas, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Iowa, where it is estimated that more than 60% of the population had been infected with the virus by the end of last year.
In the areas I Tropolitanas examined, 48% of Chicago residents, 52 % in Los Angeles, 43 % in Miami, 42% in the city of New York and 31% in Phoenix had been infected in the same period of time, points out today the EurekAlert! magazine.
The Columbia University study explains that approximately 1 of each 130 US (0. 77%) had been infected with the coronavirus virus at 31 from December to 2020 and that a similar percentage (0. 83%) had the latent virus, but it was not contagious at that time.
In certain metropolitan areas of the country, the percentage of infected individuals at the end of the year was much higher, also indicated EurekaAlert!
“Although the scenario has changed with the availability of vaccines and the spread of new variants , it is important to recognize how dangerous the pandemic was in the first year, ”said Sen Pei, assistant professor of environmental health science at the Mailman School of Public Health.
With information from EFE