About this Medicine article

Assessing changes in incubation period, serial interval, and generation time of SARS-CoV-2 variants of concern: a systematic review and meta-analysis by Xu, Xiangyanyu (author);Wu, Yanpeng (author);Kummer, Allisandra G. (author);Zhao, Yuchen (author);Hu, Zexin (author);Wang, Yan (author);Liu, Hengcong (author);Ajelli, Marco (author);Yu, Hongjie (author) is a Medicine article available to read on EtoBox.

## Background After the first COVID-19 wave caused by the ancestral lineage, the pandemic has been fueled from the continuous emergence of new SARS-CoV-2 variants. Understanding key time-to-event periods for each emerging variant of concern is critical as it can provide insights into the future trajectory of the virus and help inform outbreak preparedness and response planning. Here, we aim to examine how the incubation period, serial interval, and generation time have changed from the ancestral SARS-CoV-2 lineage to different variants of concern. ## Methods We conducted a systematic review and meta-analysis that synthesized the estimates of incubation period, serial interval, and generation time (both realized and intrinsic) for the ancestral lineage, Alpha, Beta, and Omicron variants of SARS-CoV-2. ## Results Our study included 280 records obtained from 147 household studies, contact tracing studies, or studies where epidemiological links were known. With each emerging variant, we found a progressive shortening of each of the analyzed key time-to-event periods, although we did not find statistically significant differences between the Omicron subvariants. We found that Omicron BA

Author

Xu, Xiangyanyu (author);Wu, Yanpeng (author);Kummer, Allisandra G. (author);Zhao, Yuchen (author);Hu, Zexin (author);Wang, Yan (author);Liu, Hengcong (author);Ajelli, Marco (author);Yu, Hongjie (author)

Publisher

Springer Science and Business Media LLC

Published

2023

Field

Medicine (Health Sciences)