Departments of Chemical & Biomolecular Engineering, University of Maryland, College Park, MD, USA.
Division of Applied Mechanics, Office of Science and Engineering Laboratories, Center for Devices and Radiological Health, Food and Drug Administration, Silver Spring, MD, USA.
Risk Anal. 2019 Mar;39(3):647-661. doi: 10.1111/risa.13181. Epub 2018 Sep 19.
Outbreaks of influenza represent an important health concern worldwide. In many cases, vaccines are only partially successful in reducing the infection rate, and respiratory protective devices (RPDs) are used as a complementary countermeasure. In devising a protection strategy against influenza for a given population, estimates of the level of protection afforded by different RPDs is valuable. In this article, a risk assessment model previously developed in general form was used to estimate the effectiveness of different types of protective equipment in reducing the rate of infection in an influenza outbreak. It was found that a 50% compliance in donning the device resulted in a significant (at least 50% prevalence and 20% cumulative incidence) reduction in risk for fitted and unfitted N95 respirators, high-filtration surgical masks, and both low-filtration and high-filtration pediatric masks. An 80% compliance rate essentially eliminated the influenza outbreak. The results of the present study, as well as the application of the model to related influenza scenarios, are potentially useful to public health officials in decisions involving resource allocation or education strategies.
流感疫情是全球范围内的一个重要健康关注点。在许多情况下，疫苗只能部分降低感染率，因此呼吸防护设备（RPD）被用作补充对策。在为特定人群制定针对流感的防护策略时，评估不同 RPD 提供的防护水平非常重要。在本文中，我们使用之前以一般形式开发的风险评估模型来估算不同类型的防护设备在降低流感疫情感染率方面的效果。研究发现，佩戴设备的遵守率达到 50%，就会显著降低（至少 50%的流行率和 20%的累计发病率）适配和不适配 N95 呼吸器、高过滤手术口罩以及低过滤和高过滤儿科口罩的风险。遵守率达到 80%可基本消除流感疫情。本研究的结果以及该模型在相关流感场景中的应用，对于公共卫生官员在涉及资源分配或教育策略的决策中可能具有重要意义。
