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COVID-19 Pandemic in Malegaon: SUTRA over the Three Waves

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Abstract

Over the past two years, the COVID-19 pandemic has seen multiple waves with high morbidity and mortality. Lockdowns and other prompt responses helped India's situation become less severe. Although Malegaon in the Indian state of Maharashtra has a high population density, poor hygienic standards, and oppositional local community views toward national pandemic addressing measures, it is nevertheless reasonably safe. To understand the possible reasons serosurvey was conducted to estimate the anti-SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibody levels in the Malegaon population. Also, we did SUTRA mathematical modeling to the Malegaon daily data on COVID-19 attributable events and compared it with the National and state level. The case fatality rate (CFR) in Malegaon city for the first, second, and third waves was 3.25%, 2.25%, and 0.39%, respectively. The crude death rate (CDR) for Maharashtra ranked first for the initial two waves and India for the third wave. Malegaon, meanwhile, finished second in the first two waves but fared best in the third. The Vaccination coverage for the first dose before the second wave was only 0.34% but had risen to 64.46% by 12 Oct 2022. By then, the second and booster dose coverage was 27.55% and 2.38%, respectively. Serosurvey did between 12 and 18 Jan 2022 showed a 93.93% anti-SARS-CoV-2 neutralizing antibody presence. SUTRA modeling elucidated the high levels of antibodies due to the pandemic-reach over 102% by the third wave. The serosurvey and the model explain why the pandemic severity in terms of duration and CFR during the subsequent waves, especially third wave, was milder compared to the first wave in spite of low vaccination rates.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge Municipal Corporation of Malegaon, Nashik; Motiwala (National) Homoeopathic Medical College & Hospital, Nashik; Mohammadia Tibbia College and Assayer Hospital, Malegaon; KC Ajmera Ayurved College, Dhule; Alameen Unani Medical College, Malegaon; JMF’s ACPM Medical College and Hospital, Dhule for their unrelenting help in serosurvey data collection and Shree Bhausaheb Hire Govt. Medical College, Dhule, for their contribution to estimating IgG antibody levels. We are very grateful to Mr. Yogesh Raut and Mr. Pravin Ghatekar from Maharashtra University of Health Sciences Nashik for the statistical assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Pharmaceutical Medicine, Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik, MH, 422004, India

    Prashant Shivgunde

  2. Malegaon Municipal Corporation, Malegaon, MH, 423105, India

    Sapana Thakare

  3. University Research Department, Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik, MH, 422004, India

    Sourav Sen

  4. Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik, MH, 422004, India

    Madhuri Kanitkar

  5. Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, UP, 208016, India

    Manindra Agrawal

  6. Department of Artificial Intelligence, Indian Institute of Technology Hyderabad, Kandi, TS, 502284, India

    Mathukumalli Vidyasagar

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  1. Prashant Shivgunde
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Contributions

Conceptualization: Dr. MK; Design: Mr. PS, Dr. MK; Data Curation: Mr. PS, Dr. SS, Dr. MK, Dr. MA, Dr. MV; Literature search: Mr. PS; Data acquisition: Mr. PS, Dr. ST, Dr. MK, Dr. MA, Dr. VM; Data analysis: Mr. PS, Dr. SS, Dr. MK, Dr. MA, Dr. VM; Statistical analysis: Mr. PS; Project Administration: Mr. PS; Supervision: Dr. MK; Validation: Mr. PS, Dr ST, Visualization: Mr. PS, Writing—Original Draft Preparation: Mr. PS; Writing—Review and Editing: Dr. SS, Dr. MK,; Manuscript review: Dr. MA, Dr. MV.

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Correspondence to Prashant Shivgunde.

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The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

Ethical Approval

The Institutional Ethics Committee approved this study's survey protocol at Maharashtra University of Health Sciences, Nashik (Approval No.: MUHS/IEC/2022/01).

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Informed consent was obtained from all individual participants included in the study.

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Sapana Thakare: Died March 13, 2023.

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Shivgunde, P., Thakare, S., Sen, S. et al. COVID-19 Pandemic in Malegaon: SUTRA over the Three Waves. Indian J Microbiol 63, 344–351 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12088-023-01096-3

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