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Abstract

In early January 2020, the pandemic of COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) rapidly spread from China and caused a worldwide pandemic.

Healthcare workers represent a high-risk group for acquiring COVID-19 and for nosocomial transmission of severe acute respiratory coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2).

We aimed to investigate over a 1 year period, across two pandemic waves, the SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence in employees at a Western Switzerland public hospital.

A prospective observational SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence study was proposed to all hospital employees who enrolled on a voluntary basis.

Out of 594 participants recruited on a voluntary basis, 269 volunteers (45.3 %) had anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies: this seroprevalence was twice higher than that reported in the local community. Healthcare workers with prolonged exposure to patients with COVID-19 showed a significantly higher odds ratio (OR) of having a positive SARS-CoV-2 serology [OR 3.19, 95 % confidence interval (CI) 2.16–4.74]. Symptoms showing the highest association with a positive serology were anosmia (OR 11.9, 95 % CI 5.58–30.9) and ageusia (OR 10.3, 95 % CI 4.8–26.3). A total of 17.1 % (95 % CI 12.2–21.1 %) of SARS-CoV-2 seropositive volunteers did not report a suspicion of COVID-19 in their personal history.

Overall, we observed that the impact of the second SARS-CoV-2 pandemic wave was considerable and significantly affected healthcare workers with prolonged exposure to patients with COVID-19.

  • This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License. The Microbiology Society waived the open access fees for this article.
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/content/journal/jmm/10.1099/jmm.0.001558
2022-08-03
2024-03-28
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