MRC Epidemiology Unit
Remote population surveillance for COVID-19 in the Fenland cohort
The speed at which coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has spread around the world has created a global health emergency. There is an urgent need for studies to contribute to the understanding of how to mitigate the pandemic and to support decision-making over the coming months. With the government enforced lockdown easing around the country, one of the key issues is how to avoid further waves of infection.
Therefore, we plan to measure in the Fenland Study cohort how many people have evidence in their blood of previous infection with COVID-19 and then to investigate whether it is possible to identify the COVID-19 pre-symptomatic phase using measurements of signs and symptoms collected via a smartphone App to help scientists develop better measures of early detection.
We also seek to investigate how social distancing and the easing of restrictions impacts on other health-related outcomes such as diet and physical activity.