Factors Associated with SARS-CoV-2 Infection before Vaccination among European Health Care Workers

• Published in: Medicina del lavoro 2023-06, Vol.114 (3), p.e2023022-e2023022
• Main Authors: Mansour, Ihab, Godono, Alessandro, Sansone, Emanuele, Visci, Giovanni, Spiteri, Gianluca, Lourdes Monaco, Maria Grazia, Mates, Dana, Rascu, Agripina, Duval, Xavier, Pira, Enrico, Ciocan, Catalina, Violante, Francesco, Lodi, Vittorio, De Palma, Giuseppe, Sala, Emma, Dell'Olmo, Marco, Negro, Corrado, Casolari, Loretta, Abedini, Masha, Ditano, Giorgia, Asafo, Shuffield, Boffetta, Paolo, Working Group, Orchestra Wp
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: COVID-19; Health Personnel; Humans; Original; Pandemics; SARS-CoV-2; Vaccination
• ISSN: 0025-7818; 2532-1080
• DOI: 10.23749/mdl.v114i3.14422

Health care workers (HCWs) were on the frontline of the current pandemic. We aimed at identifying determinants of SARS-CoV-2 infection and the effectiveness of personal protection equipment (PPE) worn by HCWs before vaccination. We abstracted data on SARS-CoV-2 infection based on positive PCR results and sociodemographic characteristics of 38,793 HCWs from public hospitals and public health authorities from 10 European centers. We fitted cohort-specific multivariate logistic regression models to identify determinants of infection and combined the results using random-effects meta-analyses. The overall prevalence of infection before vaccination among HCWs was 9.58%. Infection was associated with the presence of selected symptoms; no association was found between sociodemographic factors and increased risk of infection. The use of PPE and particularly FFP2/FFP3 masks had a different protective effect during the first and second waves of the COVID pandemic. The study provides evidence that mask use was the most effective PPE in preventing SARS-CoV-2 infection among HCWs.