Coronavirus disease 2019 epidemic prediction in Shanghai under the “dynamic zero-COVID policy” using time-dependent SEAIQR model

It’s urgently needed to assess the COVID-19 epidemic under the “dynamic zero-COVID policy” in China, which provides a scientific basis for evaluating the effectiveness of this strategy in COVID-19 control. Here, we developed a time-dependent susceptible-exposed-asymptomatic-infected-quarantined-removed (SEAIQR) model with stage-specific interventions based on recent Shanghai epidemic data, considering a large number of asymptomatic infectious, the changing parameters, and control procedures. The data collected from March 1st, 2022 to April 15th, 2022 were used to fit the model, and the data of subsequent 7 days and 14 days were used to evaluate the model performance of forecasting. We then calculated the effective regeneration number (Rₜ) and analyzed the sensitivity of different measures scenarios. Asymptomatic infectious accounts for the vast majority of the outbreaks in Shanghai, and Pudong is the district with the most positive cases. The peak of newly confirmed cases and newly asymptomatic infectious predicted by the SEAIQR model would appear on April 13th, 2022, with 1963 and 28,502 cases, respectively, and zero community transmission may be achieved in early to mid-May. The prediction errors for newly confirmed cases were considered to be reasonable, and newly asymptomatic infectious were considered to be good between April 16th to 22nd and reasonable between April 16th to 29th. The final ranges of cumulative confirmed cases and cumulative asymptomatic infectious predicted in this round of the epidemic were 26,477 ∼ 47,749 and 402,254 ∼ 730,176, respectively. At the beginning of the outbreak, Rₜ was 6.69. Since the implementation of comprehensive control, Rₜ showed a gradual downward trend, dropping to below 1.0 on April 15th, 2022. With the early implementation of control measures and the improvement of quarantine rate, recovery rate, and immunity threshold, the peak number of infections will continue to decrease, whereas the earlier the control is implemented, the earlier the turning point of the epidemic will arrive. The proposed time-dependent SEAIQR dynamic model fits and forecasts the epidemic well, which can provide a reference for decision making of the “dynamic zero-COVID policy”.