ArticleScience advances2021
Low case numbers enable long-term stable pandemic control without lockdowns.
Article in Science advances, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 29 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
29 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Predictive models for health outcomes due to SARS-CoV-2, including the effect of vaccination: a systematic review.Systematic reviews · 2024Pooled it
- Optimizing infectious disease mitigation under dynamic conditions.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026Article
- Mechanics of pandemics.EClinicalMedicine · 2026Review
- Lessons for future outbreaks from successful contact tracing systems in Asia.The Lancet regional health. Western Pacific · 2025Review
- Understanding Nash epidemics.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025Article
- Modeling-based design of adaptive control strategy for the effective preparation of 'Disease X'.BMC medical informatics and decision making · 2025Article
- A mathematical model to assess the effectiveness of test-trace-isolate-and-quarantine under limited capacities.PloS one · 2024Article
- Effects of public-health measures for zeroing out different SARS-CoV-2 variants.Nature communications · 2023Article
- From emergency response to long-term management: the many faces of the endemic state of COVID-19.The Lancet regional health. Europe · 2023Article
- Lessons drawn from Shanghai for controlling highly transmissible SARS-CoV-2 variants: insights from a modelling study.BMC infectious diseases · 2023Article
- Optimal strategies for coordinating infection control and socio-economic activities.Mathematics and computers in simulation · 2023Article
- Impact of the Euro 2020 championship on the spread of COVID-19.Nature communications · 2023Article
- The role of machine learning in health policies during the COVID-19 pandemic and in long COVID management.Frontiers in public health · 2023Review
- How reported outbreak data can shape individual behavior in a social world.Journal of public health policy · 2022Article
- The effectiveness of testing, vaccinations and contact restrictions for containing the CoViD-19 pandemic.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Robustness analysis for quantitative assessment of vaccination effects and SARS-CoV-2 lineages in Italy.BMC infectious diseases · 2022Article
- [Dynamic simulation of COVID-19 intensive care bed occupancy in fall/winter 2021/22 as a function of 7-day incidences].Medizinische Klinik, Intensivmedizin und Notfallmedizin · 2022Article
- The transmission game: Testing behavioral interventions in a pandemic-like simulation.Science advances · 2022Article
- Remember the past, plan for the future: How interactions between risk perception and behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic can inform future Canadian public health policy.Frontiers in public health · 2022Article
- What vaccination rate(s) minimize total societal costs after 'opening up' to COVID-19? Age-structured SIRM results for the Delta variant in Australia (New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia).PLOS global public health · 2022Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
The traditional long-term solutions for epidemic control involve eradication or population immunity. Here, we analytically derive the existence of a third viable solution: a stable equilibrium at low case numbers, where test-trace-and-isolate policies partially compensate for local spreading events and only moderate restrictions remain necessary. In this equilibrium, daily cases stabilize around ten or fewer new infections per million people. However, stability is endangered if restrictions are relaxed or case numbers grow too high. The latter destabilization marks a tipping point beyond which the spread self-accelerates. We show that a lockdown can reestablish control and that recurring lockdowns are not necessary given sustained, moderate contact reduction. We illustrate how this strategy profits from vaccination and helps mitigate variants of concern. This strategy reduces cumulative cases (and fatalities) four times more than strategies that only avoid hospital collapse. In the long term, immunization, large-scale testing, and international coordination will further facilitate control.
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.