Models to counter the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic

The work of the research group focused on the production of dozens of alternative scenarios based on which decision-makers have made their choices.

The high level of the scientific results achieved can be seen from the journals that hosted the analysis conducted (SCIENCE, THE LANCET INFECTIOUS DISEASES, EUROSURVEILLANCE, JAMA).

In particular, the studies covered three geographical areas to which specific insights were dedicated: the Lombardy region, the most acute case on the national territory, Italy and China.

Among the aspects considered were the effectiveness of the restrictive measures adopted in Italy, the effects of travel restrictions from China on the spread of the virus in the world and the probability of developing symptoms following the infection of SARS-CoV-2.

Health Emergencies Center – FBK  Publications List

PUBLICATIONS

Flavia Riccardo, Giorgio Guzzetta, Alberto Mateo Urdiales, Martina Del Manso, Xanthi D Andrianou, Antonino Bella, Patrizio Pezzotti, Simona Carbone, Tiziana De Vito, Francesco Maraglino, Vittorio Demicheli, Claudio Dario, Enrico Coscioni, Giovanni Rezza, Andrea Urbani, Stefano Merler, Silvio Brusaferro, Italian COVID-19 monitoring group: COVID-19 response: effectiveness of weekly rapid risk assessments, Italy  , PubMed.gov National Library of Medicine,February 2022

Marziano, Valentina; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Mammone, Alessia; Riccardo, Flavia; Poletti, Piero; Trentini, Filippo; Manica, Mattia; Siddu, Andrea; Bella, Antonino; Stefanelli, Paola; Pezzotti, Patrizio; Ajelli, Marco; Brusaferro, Silvio; Rezza, Giovanni; Merler, Stefano; The effect of COVID-19 vaccination in Italy and perspectives for living with the virus, NATURE COMMUNICATIONS, 2021

Cereda, Danilo; Manica, Mattia; Tirani, Marcello; Rovida, Francesca; Demicheli, Vittorio; Ajelli, Marco; Poletti, Piero; Trentini, Filippo; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Marziano, Valentina; Piccarreta, Raffaella; Barone, Antonio; Magoni, Michele; Deandrea, Silvia; Diurno, Giulio; Lombardo, Massimo; Faccini, Marino; Pan, Angelo; Bruno, Raffaele; Pariani, Elena; Grasselli, Giacomo; Piatti, Alessandra; Gramegna, Maria; Baldanti, Fausto; Melegaro, Alessia; Merler, Stefano; The early phase of the COVID-19 epidemic in Lombardy, Italy, EPIDEMICS, 2021

Zardini, Agnese; Galli, Margherita; Tirani, Marcello; Cereda, Danilo; Manica, Mattia; Trentini, Filippo; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Marziano, Valentina; Piccarreta, Raffaella; Melegaro, Alessia; Ajelli, Marco; Poletti, Piero; Merler, Stefano; A quantitative assessment of epidemiological parameters required to investigate COVID-19 burden, EPIDEMICS, 2021

Trentini, Filippo; Marziano, Valentina; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Tirani, Marcello; Cereda, Danilo; Poletti, Piero; Piccarreta, Raffaella; Barone, Antonio; Preziosi, Giuseppe; Arduini, Fabio; Valle, Petra Giulia Della; Zanella, Alberto; Grosso, Francesca; Castillo, Gabriele; Castrofino, Ambra; Grasselli, Giacomo; Melegaro, Alessia; Piatti, Alessandra; Andreassi, Aida; Gramegna, Maria; Ajelli, Marco; Merler, Stefano; The pressure on healthcare system and intensive care utilization during the COVID-19 outbreak in the Lombardy region: a retrospective observational study on 43,538 hospitalized patients, AMERICAN JOURNAL OF EPIDEMIOLOGY, 2021

Davis, Jessica T; Chinazzi, Matteo; Perra, Nicola; Mu, Kunpeng; Piontti, Ana Pastore Y; Ajelli, Marco; Dean, Natalie E; Gioannini, Corrado; Litvinova, Maria; Merler, Stefano; Rossi, Luca; Sun, Kaiyuan; Xiong, Xinyue; Longini, Ira M; Halloran, M Elizabeth; Viboud, Cécile; Vespignani, Alessandro;  Cryptic transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and the first COVID-19 wave, NATURE, 2021

Juan Yang, Valentina Marziano, Xiaowei Deng, Giorgio Guzzetta, Juanjuan Zhang, Filippo Trentini, Jun Cai, Piero Poletti, Wen Zheng, Wei Wang, Qianhui Wu, Zeyao Zhao, Kaige Dong, Guangjie Zhong, Cécile Viboud, Stefano Merler, Marco Ajelli & Hongjie Yu; Despite vaccination, China needs non-pharmaceutical interventions to prevent widespread outbreaks of COVID-19 in 2021 , NATURE HUMAN BEHAVIOUR 22 June 2021

Mattia Manica, Serena Pancheri, Piero Poletti, Giulia Giovanazzi, Giorgio Guzzetta, Filippo Trentini, Valentina Marziano, Marco Ajelli, Maria Grazia Zuccali, Pier Paolo Benetollo, Stefano Merler, Antonio Ferro; The risk of symptomatic infection during a second COVID-19 wave, in SARS-CoV-2 seropositive individuals Oxford Academic, Clinical Infectious Diseases, 16 june 2021

Giannotti, Fosca; Merler, Stefano; Pedreschi, Dino; Traverso, Paolo,  IA e i Big Data sanitari, rilevazione degli esordi e diffusione dell’epidemia, Libro Biopolitica, pandemia e democrazia. Rule of law nella società digitale, Vol. III Pandemia e tecnologie: L’impatto su processi, scuola e medicina, april 2021

Stefanelli, Paola; Bella, Antonino; Fedele, Giorgio; Pancheri, Serena; Leone, Pasqualina; Vacca, Paola; Neri, Arianna; Carannante, Anna; Fazio, Cecilia; Benedetti, Eleonora; Fiore, Stefano; Fabiani, Concetta; Simmaco, Maurizio; Santino, Iolanda; Zuccali, Maria Grazia; Bizzarri, Giancarlo; Magnoni, Rosa; Benetollo, Pier Paolo; Merler, Stefano; Brusaferro, Silvio; Rezza, Giovanni; Ferro, Antonio, Prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibodies in an area of North-eastern Italy with a high incidence of COVID-19 cases: a population-based study  , CMI, April 2021

Poletti, Piero; Tirani, Marcello; Cereda, Danilo; Trentini, Filippo; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Sabatino, Giuliana; Marziano, Valentina; Castrofino, Ambra; Grosso, Francesca; Del Castillo, Gabriele; Piccarreta, Raffaella; Andreassi, Aida; Melegaro, Alessia; Gramegna, Maria; Ajelli, Marco; Merler, Stefano,  Association of Age With Likelihood of Developing Symptoms and Critical Disease Among Close Contacts Exposed to Patients With Confirmed SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Italy Jama Network, March 2021

Filippo Trentini, Giorgio Guzzetta, Margherita Galli, Agnese Zardini, Fabio Manenti, Giovanni Putoto, Valentina Marziano, Worku Nigussa Gamshie, Ademe Tsegaye, Alessandro Greblo, Alessia Melegaro, Marco Ajelli, Stefano Merler & Piero Poletti, Modeling the interplay between demography, social contact patterns, and SARS-CoV-2 transmission in the South West Shewa Zone of Oromia Region, Ethiopia   BMC Medicine, 09 APRILE 2021

Valentina Marziano, Giorgio Guzzetta, Alessia Mammone, Flavia Riccardo, Piero Poletti, Filippo Trentini, Mattia Manica, Andrea Siddu, Paola Stefanelli, Patrizio Pezzotti, Marco Ajelli, Silvio Brusaferro, Giovanni Rezza, Stefano Merler  “Return to normal: COVID-19 vaccination under mitigation measures” 

A  recent new document entitled “COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios” published on 19 March 2021 by the Center for disease and control prevention (CDC), one of the main operational components of the Department of Health and Human Services (Department of Health and Human Services) of the United States of America is aimed at monitoring the evolution scenarios of the pandemic from Covid-19. In the document, the American organization indicates two works published by researchers from the FBK Center for Health Emergencies, led by epidemiologist Stefano Merler, as reference studies. COVID-19 Pandemic Planning Scenarios , March 2021

Guzzetta, Giorgio; Riccardo, Flavia; Marziano, Valentina; Poletti, Piero; Trentini, Filippo; Bella, Antonino; Andrianou, Xanthi; Del Manso, Martina; Fabiani, Massimo; Bellino, Stefania; Boros, Stefano; Urdiales, Alberto Mateo; Vescio, Maria Fenicia; Piccioli, Andrea; Brusaferro, Silvio; Rezza, Giovanni; Pezzotti, Patrizio; Ajelli, Marco; Merler, Stefano  Impact of a Nationwide Lockdown on SARS-CoV-2 Transmissibility, Italy   EID Journal, Volume 27, Number 1 January 2021

Marziano, Valentina; Guzzetta, Giorgio; Rondinone, Bruna Maria; Boccuni, Fabio; Riccardo, Flavia; Bella, Antonino; Poletti, Piero; Trentini, Filippo; Pezzotti, Patrizio; Brusaferro, Silvio; Rezza, Giovanni; Iavicoli, Sergio; Ajelli, Marco; Merler, Stefano  Retrospective analysis of the Italian exit strategy from COVID-19 lockdown PNAS Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America Volume 12 Number 1

Piero Poletti,  Marcello Tirani,  Danilo Cereda,  Filippo Trentini,  Giorgio Guzzetta, Giuliana Sabatino,  Valentina Marziano, Ambra Castrofino,  Francesca Grosso, Gabriele Del Castillo,  Raffaella Piccarreta,  Aida Andreassi,  Alessia Melegaro,  Maria Gramegna, Marco Ajelli,  Stefano Merler Association of Age With Likelihood of Developing Symptoms and Critical Disease Among Close Contacts Exposed to Patients With Confirmed SARS-CoV-2 Infection in Italy  in “JAMA Network Open”, March 10 2021

Quan-Hui Liu, Ana I. Bento, Kexin Yang, Hang Zhang, Xiaohan Yang, Stefano Merler, Alessandro Vespignani, Jiancheng Lv, Hongjie Yu, Wei Zhang, Tao Zhou, Marco Ajelli  The COVID-19 outbreak in Sichuan, China: Epidemiology and impact of interventions in “Plos Biology” 16 (12)

Flavia Riccardo, Marco Ajelli, Xanthi D Andrianou1, Antonino Bella, Martina Del Manso, Massimo Fabiani, Stefania Bellino, Stefano Boros, Alberto Mateo Urdiales, Valentina Marziano, Maria Cristina Rota, Antonietta Filia, Fortunato D’Ancona, Andrea Siddu, Ornella Punzo, Filippo Trentini, Giorgio Guzzetta, Piero Poletti, Paola Stefanelli, Maria Rita Castrucci, Alessandra Ciervo, Corrado Di Benedetto, Marco Tallon, Andrea Piccioli, Silvio Brusaferro, Giovanni Rezza, Stefano Merler, Patrizio Pezzotti, the COVID-19 working group  Epidemiological characteristics of COVID-19 cases and estimates of the reproductive numbers 1 month into the epidemic, Italy, 28 January to 31 March 2020 in EUROSURVEILLANCE, Volume 25, issue 49

Paola Stefanelli; Antonino Bella; Giorgio Fedele; Serena Pancheri; Pasqualina Leone; Paola Vacca; Arianna Neri; Anna Carannante; Cecilia Fazio; Eleonora Benedetti; Stefano Fiore; Concetta Fabiani; Maurizio Simmaco; Iolanda Santino; Maria Grazia Zuccali,; Giancarlo Bizzarri; Rosa Magnoni; Pier Paolo Benetollo; Stefano Merler; Silvio Brusaferro; Giovanni Rezza; Antonio Ferro
Prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 IgG antibodies in an area of North-eastern Italy with a high incidence of COVID-19 cases: a population-based study, in “ScienceDirect” Volume 26 Issue 11

Chinazzi, Matteo; Davis, Jessica T; Ajelli, Marco; Gioannini, Corrado; Litvinova, Maria; Merler, Stefano; Pastore Y Piontti, Ana; Mu, Kunpeng; Rossi, Luca; Sun, Kaiyuan; Viboud, Cécile; Xiong, Xinyue; Yu, Hongjie; Halloran, M Elizabeth; Longini, Ira M; Vespignani, Alessandro, The effect of travel restrictions on the spread of the 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak, in «SCIENCE», vol. 368, n. 6489, 2020, pp. 395 -400

Zhang, Juanjuan; Litvinova, Maria; Liang, Yuxia; Wang, Yan; Wang, Wei; Zhao, Shanlu; Wu, Qianhui; Merler, Stefano; Viboud, Cécile; Vespignani, Alessandro; Ajelli, Marco; Yu, Hongjie, Changes in contact patterns shape the dynamics of the COVID-19 outbreak in China, in «SCIENCE», 2020, pp. eabb8001

Grasselli, Giacomo; Zangrillo, Alberto; Zanella, Alberto; Antonelli, Massimo; Cabrini, Luca; Castelli, Antonio; Cereda, Danilo; Coluccello, Antonio; Foti, Giuseppe; Fumagalli, Roberto; Iotti, Giorgio; Latronico, Nicola; Lorini, Luca; Merler, Stefano; Natalini, Giuseppe; Piatti, Alessandra; Ranieri, Marco Vito; Scandroglio, Anna Mara; Storti, Enrico; Cecconi, Maurizio; Pesenti, Antonio, Baseline Characteristics and Outcomes of 1591 Patients Infected With SARS-CoV-2 Admitted to ICUs of the Lombardy Region, Italy, in «JAMA», 2020

Zhang, Juanjuan; Litvinova, Maria; Wang, Wei; Wang, Yan; Deng, Xiaowei; Chen, Xinghui; Li, Mei; Zheng, Wen; Yi, Lan; Chen, Xinhua; Wu, Qianhui; Liang, Yuxia; Wang, Xiling; Yang, Juan; Sun, Kaiyuan; Longini, Ira M; Halloran, M Elizabeth; Wu, Peng; Cowling, Benjamin J; Merler, Stefano; Viboud, Cecile; Vespignani, Alessandro; Ajelli, Marco; Yu, Hongjie, Evolving epidemiology and transmission dynamics of coronavirus disease 2019 outside Hubei province, China: a descriptive and modelling study, in «THE LANCET INFECTIOUS DISEASES», 2020

Guzzetta, Giorgio; Poletti, Piero; Ajelli, Marco; Trentini, Filippo; Marziano, Valentina; Cereda, Danilo; Tirani, Marcello; Diurno, Giulio; Bodina, Annalisa; Barone, Antonio; Crottogini, Lucia; Gramegna, Maria; Melegaro, Alessia; Merler, Stefano, Potential short-term outcome of an uncontrolled COVID-19 epidemic in Lombardy, Italy, February to March 2020, in «EUROSURVEILLANCE», vol. 25, n. 12, 2020

Piero Poletti, Marcello Tirani, Danilo Cereda, Filippo Trentini, Giorgio Guzzetta, Giuliana Sabatino, Valentina Marziano, Ambra Castrofino, Francesca Grosso, Gabriele Del Castillo, Raffaella Piccarreta, ATS Lombardy COVID-19 Task Force, Aida Andreassi, Alessia Melegaro, Maria Gramegna, Marco Ajelli, Stefano Merler Probability of symptoms and critical disease after SARS-CoV-2 infection

Aleta, Alberto; Martín-Corral, David; Pastore y Piontti, Ana; Ajelli, Marco; Litvinova, Maria; Chinazzi, Matteo; Dean, Natalie E.; Halloran, M. Elizabeth; Longini Jr, Ira M.; Merler, Stefano; Pentland, Alex; Vespignani, Alessandro; Moro, Esteban; Moreno, Yamir. Modelling the impact of testing, contact tracing and household quarantine on second waves of COVID-19  in «NATURE HUMAN BEHAVIOUR», vol.4, 2020

Deng, Xiaowei; Yang, Juan; Wang, Wei; Wang, Xiling; Zhou, Jiaxin; Chen, Zhiyuan; Li, Jing; Chen, Yinzi; Yan, Han; Zhang, Juanjuan; Zhang, Yongli; Wang, Yan; Qiu, Qi; Gong, Hui; Wei, Xianglin; Wang, Lili; Sun, Kaiyuan; Wu, Peng; Ajelli, Marco; Cowling, Benjamin J; Viboud, Cecile; Yu, Hongjie  Case fatality risk of the first pandemic wave of novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) in China in «CLINICAL INFECTIOUS DISEASES», 2020