Publications by authors named "Hemalatha Masanam Sriramulu"

Introduction: Analysis of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) surveillance system in the first wave indicated that the data-driven approach helped in resource allocation and public health interventions.

Objectives: We described the epidemiology of COVID-19 cases in Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India, from February 2021 to February 2022.

Materials And Methods: We analyzed the COVID-19 surveillance data from Chennai City, Tamil Nadu, India's Greater Chennai Corporation.

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India experienced a surge in COVID-19 cases during the second wave in the period of April-June 2021. A rapid rise in cases posed challenges to triaging patients in hospital settings. Chennai, the fourth largest metropolitan city in India with an 8 million population, reported 7564 COVID-19 cases on May 12, 2021, nearly 3 times higher than the number of cases in the peak of COVID-19 in 2020.

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During the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the majority of the identified COVID-19 patients in Chennai, a southern metropolitan city of India, presented as asymptomatic or with mild clinical illness. Providing facility-based care for these patients was not feasible in an overburdened health system. Thus, providing home-based clinical care for patients who were asymptomatic or with mild clinical illnesses was a viable solution.

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Article Synopsis
  • The study examines public health strategies employed in Chennai, India, to manage COVID-19 from March to October 2020, focusing on surveillance, testing, contact tracing, and quarantine efforts.
  • Chennai experienced a peak incidence of COVID-19 cases among older adults, with significant fluctuations in case numbers and a total of 3543 deaths reported by October 2020.
  • The effective reproduction number (R) decreased from 4.2 in March to below one in July, suggesting that the implemented strategies were effective in reducing the spread of the virus in a densely populated setting.
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Article Synopsis
  • A survey was conducted in Chennai, India, to measure the presence of IgG antibodies against the SARS-CoV-2 virus.
  • Out of 12,405 serum samples tested, the weighted seroprevalence of IgG was found to be 18.4%.
  • The results suggest that a large portion of Chennai's population remains vulnerable to COVID-19.
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