ArticlePeerJ2021
Estimating the impact of influenza on the epidemiological dynamics of SARS-CoV-2.
Article in PeerJ, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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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
8 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- A scoping review of COVID-19 modelling studies in Belgium 2020-2024: incorporation of behaviour and lessons learned.Archives of public health = Archives belges de sante publique · 2026Pooled it
- The limitations of non-mechanistic methods for characterizing pathogen-pathogen interactions: A simulation study.PLoS computational biology · 2026Article
- Interactions of SARS-CoV-2, influenza and respiratory syncytial virus influence epidemic timing and risk.Communications medicine · 2026Article
- A hybrid STL-LightGBM framework with probabilistic forecasting for Influenza A incidence in the post-pandemic Saudi Arabia.Frontiers in public health · 2026Article
- Characterizing the interactions between influenza and respiratory syncytial viruses and their implications for epidemic control.Nature communications · 2024Article
- Early warning of emerging infectious diseases based on multimodal data.Biosafety and health · 2023Review
- The interactions of SARS-CoV-2 with cocirculating pathogens: Epidemiological implications and current knowledge gaps.PLoS pathogens · 2023Review
- COVID-19 and Seasonal Influenza Vaccination: Cross-Protection, Co-Administration, Combination Vaccines, and Hesitancy.Pharmaceuticals (Basel, Switzerland) · 2022Review
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
As in past pandemics, co-circulating pathogens may play a role in the epidemiology of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), caused by the novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). In particular, experimental evidence indicates that influenza infection can up-regulate the expression of ACE2-the receptor of SARS-CoV-2 in human cells-and facilitate SARS-CoV-2 infection. Here we hypothesized that influenza impacted the epidemiology of SARS-CoV-2 during the early 2020 epidemic of COVID-19 in Europe. To test this hypothesis, we developed a population-based model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission and of COVID-19 mortality, which simultaneously incorporated the impact of non-pharmaceutical control measures and of influenza on the epidemiological dynamics of SARS-CoV-2. Using statistical inference methods based on iterated filtering, we confronted this model with mortality incidence data in four European countries (Belgium, Italy, Norway, and Spain) to systematically test a range of assumptions about the impact of influenza. We found consistent evidence for a 1.8-3.4-fold (uncertainty range across countries: 1.1 to 5.0) average population-level increase in SARS-CoV-2 transmission associated with influenza during the period of co-circulation. These estimates remained robust to a variety of alternative assumptions regarding the epidemiological traits of SARS-CoV-2 and the modeled impact of control measures. Although further confirmatory evidence is required, our results suggest that influenza could facilitate the spread and hamper effective control of SARS-CoV-2. More generally, they highlight the possible role of co-circulating pathogens in the epidemiology of COVID-19.
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