Abstract

Materials and Methods

Results

SARS-CoV-2 IgG Seroprevalence among Blood Donors

Our study included data from 7,837 donors who gave blood at 7 donation centers in Brazil during March 1–December 31, 2020. The total number of samples included in the study represents 6.4% of all blood donations in the selected centers during the study period. Serologic testing to identify SARS-CoV-2 IgG revealed 441 (5.63%) positive blood donors during the study period. When adjusted for sensitivity and specificity of the test, the overall rate of positivity was 5.20% (95% CI 4.65%–5.80%). Male donors had 1.35 (95% CI 1.12–1.63) times the odds of being seropositive than did female donors. The type of donor (first-time vs. repeat donor) did not represent a statistically significant difference between groups who were positive or negative for SARS-CoV-2 IgG. Age also was not a statistically significant difference, either across age groups after adjusting for multiple hypotheses tests using the Holm correction or when regressing the rate of positivity on age by using simple linear regression (Table). We calculated the evolving seroprevalence over all months of 2020 in each blood center and its geographic location in Minas Gerais (Figure 1). In most blood centers, the increase in seroprevalence rates was slower in the first months, accelerated in August, but became faster during October (Appendix Table).

Table

Characteristics and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 IgG seroprevalence among blood donors, Brazil, March–December 2020

Characteristics	Total samples	Positive samples	Unadjusted seroprevalence, % (95% CI)	Test-adjusted seroprevalence, % (95% CI)*	Odds ratio (95% CI)
Total	7,837	441	5.6 (5.1–6.2)	5.2 (4.7–5.8)
Sex
M	4,284	273	6.4 (5.7–7.1)	6.0 (5.3–6.9)	1.4 (1.1–1.6)
F	3,553	168	4.7 (4.1–5.5)	4.2 (3.5–5.0)
Age range, y
16–30	2,895	153	5.3 (4.5–6.2)	4.8 (4.0–5.8)
31–40	2,330	135	5.8 (4.9–6.8)	5.4 (4.4–6.5)
41–50	1,701	115	6.8 (5.7–8.1)	6.5 (5.3–7.9)
51–60	829	32	3.9 (2.8–5.4)	3.2 (2.0–4.9)
61–70	82	6	7.3 (3.4–15.1)	7.1 (2.7–15.8)
Donor type
First-time donor	1,483	72	4.9 (3.9–6.1)	4.3 (3.2–5.7)	0.8 (0.7–1.1)
Repeat donor	6,353	369	5.8 (5.3–6.4)	5.4 (4.8–6.1)

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*Considering sensitivity of 90% and specificity of 99%. Analysis performed by Epitool by using Wilson’s confidence interval for apparent rate of positivity and Blaker’s CI for true rate of positivity.

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Figure 1

Temporal evolving cumulative severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) seroprevalence in HEMOMINAS Foundation blood donation centers in 7 cities of Minas Gerais, Brazil, March–December 2020. A) March; B) June; C) September; D) December. Data represent SARS-CoV-2 IgG seropositivity among persons eligible to donate blood. Scale bar represents cumulative proportion of SARS-CoV-2 IgG seropositivity per 100,000 population. Gov., Governador.

Model Assessment

The evolution of apparent lethality of COVID-19 (deaths divided by reported cases) in the cities that host blood centers (except Uberlândia) suggests that the proportion of infected persons tested changed around day 122, July 16, and increased by nearly 70% (Figure 2). That date coincides with the time when additional laboratories were integrated into the testing infrastructure for SARS-CoV-2 provided by the state government. In the case of Uberlândia, the municipality provided a relevant testing infrastructure in addition to the infrastructure provided by the state government in all other cities. Those data provide independent information about the relative changes in the value of α, which can be used for assessing the model consistency.

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Figure 2

Apparent lethality of coronavirus disease (COVID-19) in 6 cities (Belo Horizonte, Pouso Alegre, Montes Claros, Juiz de Fora, Governador Valadares, and Uberaba), Minas Gerais State, Brazil, April–December 2020. Gray shading and gray data line indicate the beginning of the COVID-19 epidemic in Minas Gerais, days 1–60, in which few cases were reported and the testing infrastructure was still being organized. Red data line indicates days 61–290 of the epidemic. Our model predicted the apparent lethality during days 60–120 to be nearly 5.2% and to fall during days 121–290 to nearly 3.0% (gray horizontal lines). This change corresponds to a nearly 70% increase in the value of α in our model (proportion of infected persons that are reported), assuming that the actual lethality has not changed. We did not include data from the city of Uberlândia in this estimation due to local legislation regulating COVID-19 testing, which resulted in a much larger proportion of people being tested in that municipality than in the other cities. Markings for each month represent the first day of the month.

We performed this assessment by running the model with α taking the same value in all cities except Uberlândia, assuming a fixed value that we increased by 70% at day 122 (July 16; t = 122 days) and that remained fixed on this new value from July 16–December 31. We determined the initial value of α that enabled the best fitting of the observed IgG rates of positivity in the blood centers was 0.18 for the proportion of reported cases up to t = 122 days and was 0.31 for t>122 days in Belo Horizonte, Governador Valadares, Juiz de Fora, Montes Claros, Pouso Alegre, and Uberaba. For Uberlândia, we found the values were 0.37 for t<122 and 0.41 for t>122.

We superimposed the seroprevalences in the blood centers each month onto the estimated curves of accumulated number of cases (reported and unreported) as predicted by the model in the respective cities (Figure 3). In 5 cities (Belo Horizonte, Juiz de Fora, Montes Claros, Uberlândia, and Uberaba), these parameter values resulted in reasonable matches with almost all data points. In 2 cities, Governador Valadares and Pouso Alegre, the seroprevalence data in the last period (October–December) were not well-adjusted to the model, suggesting that the pattern of variation of α in those cities could be different from the variations in other cities. However, because Governador Valadares and Pouso Alegre are small cities, a separate analysis of the change in the apparent lethality is not possible, which prevents the possibility of applying the same methodology for refining the estimates when comparing cities of varying populations.

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Figure 3

Proportion of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) IgG–positive results among blood donors in blood donation centers in 7 cities in Minas Gerais, Brazil, March–December 2020. A) Belo Horizonte; B) Governador Valadares; C) Juiz de Fora; D) Montes Claros; E) Pouso Alegre; F) Uberaba; G) Uberlândia. Blue dots indicate proportion of SARS-CoV-2–positive donors at the end each month; vertical blue lines indicate 95% CIs. Black squares indicate the official cumulative prevalence of reported coronavirus disease cases for each city. Red lines represent model estimates of the number of infected persons, including reported and unreported cases, in each city, as a proportion of the city’s population. Vertical dashed lines indicate national holidays.

Discussion

In this study, we evaluated the rate of blood donors who tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 IgG and donated blood in 7 cities in Minas Gerais, Brazil, during March–December 2020. We used the data to estimate the rate of infection in the general population, then used the infection rate in a dynamic model with a SEIR structure.

The higher rate of IgG positivity found in male donors (6.4% vs. 4.7% for female donors) in our study did not agree with the reported COVID-19 cases in Minas Gerais during the same period (49.2% for male vs. 50.8% for female persons). The higher proportion of positive tests among male donors suggests that the epidemiologic profile of infection might change when more persons with asymptomatic or mild COVID-19 are tested, such as expected for blood donors. The rate of positivity associated with sex has been previously observed (18), but different works did not identify this association in blood donors (19–21) or in the general population (22).

Concerning differences of positivity between age groups, we found no statistically significant difference in this study. Differences in positivity between age groups is a controversial issue; some studies report higher seroprevalence in younger persons (19,23), but other studies indicate greater seroprevalence in older persons (24) or do not find statistically significant associations between seroprevalence and age (25). A study conducted in 133 cities in Brazil found that persons 20–59 years of age, an age group that corresponds to most blood donors included in this study, were more likely to be infected (26). The differences between studies might be partly explained by cultural and population issues, making it difficult to consolidate a general conclusion. Loss of statistical power resulting from corrections for testing multiple hypotheses might also play a role in the observed differences not achieving statistical significance, particularly if the effect size is moderate.

Seroprevalence in the blood donation centers showed the proportion of positive donors increased slowly in the first 6 months, and higher proportions of positivity were recorded from August onward, with regional variations. In Minas Gerais, COVID-19 cases increased in June, peaked in August, decreased slowly until October, and then reached the highest numbers in December 2020. Our results agree with this scenario, suggesting that seroprevalence rates in blood donors correlated with reported COVID-19 case rates. A crucial feature of the rate of positivity indicated by serologic testing in the blood centers is that seroprevalence is much greater than prevalence that would be obtained by the accumulated number of reported COVID-19 cases. However, we expected this difference because of underreporting. Notwithstanding, public communication about COVID-19 epidemics is commonly articulated on the basis of reported cases in the community, which strongly underestimates the actual spread of the disease. This difference underscores the convenience of using a model-based approach, as we propose, because it enables the use of measured data for estimating hidden variables, such as the total number of infected persons.

Although all the cities we evaluated had increased COVID-19 positivity rates in December 2020, Governador Valadares had the highest rates. This finding is in consonance with the fact that Governador Valadares had a higher accumulated COVID-19 incidence, 4,227.8 cases/100,000 population, than was seen in Minas Gerais (2,270.1 cases/100,000 population) and Brazil overall (3,383.6 cases/100,000 population). Governador Valadares also had a higher COVID-19 mortality rate, 143 deaths/100,000 population, than Minas Gerais (51.3 deaths/100,000 population) or Brazil (88 deaths/100,000 population).

Several countries are implementing serial SARS-CoV-2 serologic surveillance studies by using blood donors (19,23,27). These studies provide relevant results to complement population seroprevalence data (19) and valuable information for decision-making in countries where such data are not available. However, some issues should be considered, including the appropriate test to assess seroprevalence and the threshold for identifying positive and negative samples. Of note, the automated serologic tests that are available were validated by using samples from symptomatic COVID-19 patients with a confirmed diagnosis by reverse transcription PCR (E.W. Eyre et al., unpub. data, https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.07.21.20159038). Results obtained in other studies using the same chemiluminescence test indicated a lower sensitivity to detect SARS-CoV-2 IgG in newly infected persons (28), which might affect the extrapolation of seroprevalence data to the population when using blood donors’ samples (11,29). These data reinforce the need for choosing serologic assays with high sensitivity, specificity, and durable antibody detection, even months after infection (30; M. Stone et al., unpub. data, https://doi.org/10.1101/2021.09.04.21262414).

Blood donor–based estimates of SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence might deviate from the seroprevalence in the general population for several reasons, including the exclusion of populations who cannot donate blood, such as persons <16 and >70 years of age and residents of nursing homes and prisons. The proportion of different groups (e.g., male and female donors, or different age groups) represented in the samples might differ from their respective proportions in population. In addition, recruitment and eligibility criteria for blood donations recommended by the Brazil Ministry of Health during the COVID-19 pandemic excluded asymptomatic candidates who had contact with infected persons <30 days before going to a donation center; those donors had to wait 14 days from the date they were first seen at the blood center before they could donate. The recommendation also excluded potential blood donors who had a COVID-19 diagnosis until >30 days after their symptoms disappeared (31). Such guidelines might result in decreased SARS-CoV-2 IgG seropositivity rates among blood donors.

The results of our study comparing prevalence estimates obtained using the SEIR model with actual health system notification data suggest that blood donor serosurveillance data can provide valuable information for monitoring the epidemic and evaluating the effectiveness of measures to fight the virus spread in the cities that have blood donation centers. Our study also showed that the evolution of the epidemic can be considerably different from city to city, even considering cities within the same state in Brazil, suggesting that the application of the proposed SEIR model in other cities would require some strategy of periodic collection of blood samples for serologic analysis from a sufficient number of persons spread across the population.

Some aspects of the proposed modeling approach should be highlighted. First, the procedure for estimating the time-varying transmission rate β for the SEIR model enables a reasonable automatic estimation of that parameter, thus circumventing a major difficulty in COVID-19 modeling (12,14). As a byproduct, this procedure also eliminates the difficulty usually encountered in determining adequate initial conditions. In fact, the SEIR model, once endowed with the estimation procedure for β, becomes equivalent to a state observer model (13,15), producing estimates of the model’s hidden variables that will approximate the real unmeasured variables, regardless of initial conditions, provided that the model parameters are reasonable approximations of the actual parameters.

The estimated hidden variables might be quite useful in practice. For instance, β(t) provides information that is not contained in the reproduction number, R_t, because β(t) does not vary with the number of recovered persons, representing a better descriptor of social isolation intensity. Perhaps counterintuitively, the cumulative incidence estimate provided by the model can be considered more reliable than the monthly point estimates derived from raw data of serologic analysis in blood centers because the model performs a filtering of the random variation in data that results from sampling.

Concerning assessment of the proposed model, users could choose different values for the α parameter for each city and for each month, according to the outcomes of serologic tests in the respective blood donation centers. Thus, the accumulated incidence of cases estimated by the model would be forced to follow the trajectory of serology results, which would not confirm the model validity. The procedure of model assessment we adopted used the same trajectories for α in 6 cities and got the changes in α from an independent source. The consistency of the model outcomes with the serology results in most of data points, considering cities with rather different trajectories of the epidemics, provides corroboration of our proposed model.

The first limitation of our study is that the stratification of the blood donors by sex or by age would enable the correction of the seroprevalence estimates according to the demographic composition of the general population, leading to more precise results. As we observed (Figure 3), the prevalence in some cities showed a systematic tendency to remain below the values predicted by the model in the last 3 months, which also suggests that a relevant process of seroconversion might exist as IgG wanes. Modeling of such a decay process might help provide the correct interpretation of data in the last months of our experiment. Finally, some of the blood donation centers considered in this study are relatively small (Pouso Alegre and Uberaba), which increases the uncertainty associated with the data collected in those centers, not only by reducing the sample size, but also by reducing the robustness to skewed data.

In conclusion, the results of our study suggest that blood donation centers could be incorporated into COVID-19 surveillance systems with the role of regularly providing quantitative estimates of SARS-CoV-2 seroprevalence in the population. For this purpose, public health agencies should use an epidemic model with a state observer property, which performs a track of some measured variable and produces outputs that converge to the system’s hidden variables. Thus, we propose a specific SEIR epidemic model that performs the adjustment of the transmission rate β such that the model tracks the measured number of reported COVID-19 cases. Our model used seroprevalence data collected in blood centers to adjust the proportion of reported cases considered. This model provided consistent estimates of relevant variables that otherwise would not be accessible, thus supporting a well-informed decision-making process. The methods we propose can be adapted for surveillance of other infectious diseases by using other kinds of input information from sentinel surveillance systems combined with serosurveillance data gathered in blood donation centers.

Acknowledgments

Footnotes

References