Documents Rhodes, Sarah 5 results

"Objective This study aimed to understand whether the proportionate mortality of COVID-19 for various occupational groups has varied over the pandemic.

Methods We used the Office for National Statistics (ONS) mortality data for England and Wales. The deaths (20–64 years) were classified as either COVID-19-related using ICD-10 codes (U07.1, U07.2), or from other causes. Occupational data recorded at the time of death was coded using the SOC10 coding system into 13 groups. Three time periods (TP) were used: (i) January 2020 to September 2020; (ii) October 2020–May 2021; and (iii) June 2021–October 2021. We analyzed the data with logistic regression and compared odds of death by COVID-19 to other causes, adjusting for age, sex, deprivation, region, urban/rural and population density.

Results Healthcare professionals and associates had a higher proportionate odds of COVID-19 death in TP1 compared to non-essential workers but were not observed to have increased odds thereafter. Medical support staff had increased odds of death from COVID-19 during both TP1 and TP2, but this had reduced by TP3. This latter pattern was also seen for social care, food retail and distribution, and bus and coach drivers. Taxi and cab drivers were the only group that had higher odds of death from COVID-19 compared to other causes throughout the whole period under study [TP1: odds ratio (OR) 2.42, 95% confidence interval (CI) 1.99–2.93; TP2: OR 3.15, 95% CI 2.63–3.78; TP3: OR 1.7, 95% CI 1.26–2.29].

Conclusion Differences in the odds of death from COVID-19 between occupational groups has declined over the course of the pandemic, although some occupations have remained relatively high throughout."

"Background:
Exposure to SARS-CoV-2, subsequent development of COVID-19 and death from COVID-19 may vary by occupation, and the risks may be higher for those categorised as 'essential workers'.
Methods:
We estimated excess mortality by occupational group and sex separately for each month in 2020 and for the entire 12 months overall.
Results:
Mortality for all adults of working age was similar to the annual average over the previous 5 years. Monthly excess mortality peaked in April, when the number of deaths was 54.2% higher than expected and was lowest in December when deaths were 30.0% lower than expected.Essential workers had consistently higher excess mortality than other groups throughout 2020. There were also large differences in excess mortality between the categories of essential workers, with healthcare workers having the highest excess mortality and social care and education workers having the lowest. Excess mortality also varied widely between men and women, even within the same occupational group. Generally, excess mortality was higher in men.
Conclusions:
summary, excess mortality was consistently higher for essential workers throughout 2020, particularly for healthcare workers. Further research is needed to examine excess mortality by occupational group, while controlling for important confounders such as ethnicity and socioeconomic status. For non-essential workers, the lockdowns, encouragement to work from home and to maintain social distancing are likely to have prevented a number of deaths from COVID-19 and from other causes."

"Background
Concern remains about how occupational SARS-CoV-2 risk has evolved during the COVID-19 pandemic. We aimed to ascertain occupations with the greatest risk of SARS-CoV-2 infection and explore how relative differences varied over the pandemic.

Methods
Analysis of cohort data from the UK Office of National Statistics COVID-19 Infection Survey from April 2020 to November 2021. This survey is designed to be representative of the UK population and uses regular PCR testing. Cox and multilevel logistic regression were used to compare SARS-CoV-2 infection between occupational/sector groups, overall and by four time periods with interactions, adjusted for age, sex, ethnicity, deprivation, region, household size, urban/rural neighbourhood and current health conditions.

Results
Based on 3 910 311 observations (visits) from 312 304 working age adults, elevated risks of infection can be seen overall for social care (HR 1.14; 95% CI 1.04 to 1.24), education (HR 1.31; 95% CI 1.23 to 1.39), bus and coach drivers (1.43; 95% CI 1.03 to 1.97) and police and protective services (HR 1.45; 95% CI 1.29 to 1.62) when compared with non-essential workers. By time period, relative differences were more pronounced early in the pandemic. For healthcare elevated odds in the early waves switched to a reduction in the later stages. Education saw raises after the initial lockdown and this has persisted. Adjustment for covariates made very little difference to effect estimates.

Conclusions
Elevated risks among healthcare workers have diminished over time but education workers have had persistently higher risks. Long-term mitigation measures in certain workplaces may be warranted."

"Objectives
Food processing facilities represent critical infrastructure that have stayed open during much of the COVID-19 pandemic. Understanding the burden of COVID-19 in this sector is thus important to help reduce the potential for workplace infection in future outbreaks.
Methods
We undertook a workplace survey in the UK food and drink processing sector and collected information on workplace size, characteristics (e.g. temperature, ventilation), and experience with COVID-19 (e.g. numbers of positive cases). For each site, we calculated COVID-19 case rates per month per 1000 workers. We performed an ecological analysis using negative binomial regression to assess the association between COVID-19 rates and workplace and local risk factors.
Results
Respondents from 33 companies including 66 individual sites completed the survey. COVID-19 cases were reported from the start of the pandemic up to June 2021. Respondents represented a range of industry subgroups, including grain milling/storage (n = 16), manufacture of malt (n = 14), manufacture of prepared meals (n = 12), manufacture of beverages (n = 8), distilling (n = 5), manufacture of baked goods (n = 5), and other (n = 6), with a total of 15 563 workers across all sites. Average monthly case rates per 1000 workers ranged from 0.9 in distilling to 6.1 in grain milling/storage. Incidence rate ratios were partially attenuated after adjusting for several local and workplace factors, though risks for one subgroup (grain milling/storage) remained elevated. Certain local and workplace characteristics were related to higher infection rates, such as higher deprivation (5 km only), a lower proportion of remote workers, lower proportion of workers in close proximity, and higher numbers of workers overall.
Conclusions
Our analysis suggests some heterogeneity in the rates of COVID-19 across sectors of the UK food and drink processing industry. Infection rates were associated with deprivation, the proportions of remote workers and workers in close proximity, and the number of workers."

"Objective This study aimed to assess whether workplace exposures as estimated via a COVID-19 job exposure matrix (JEM) are associated with SARS-CoV-2 in the UK.

Methods Data on 244 470 participants were available from the Office for National Statistics Coronavirus Infection Survey (CIS) and 16 801 participants from the Virus Watch Cohort, restricted to workers aged 20–64 years. Analysis used logistic regression models with SARS-CoV-2 as the dependent variable for eight individual JEM domains (number of workers, nature of contacts, contact via surfaces, indoor or outdoor location, ability to social distance, use of face covering, job insecurity, and migrant workers) with adjustment for age, sex, ethnicity, index of multiple deprivation (IMD), region, household size, urban versus rural area, and health conditions. Analyses were repeated for three time periods (i) February 2020 (Virus Watch)/April 2020 (CIS) to May 2021), (ii) June 2021 to November 2021, and (iii) December 2021 to January 2022.

Results Overall, higher risk classifications for the first six domains tended to be associated with an increased risk of infection, with little evidence of a relationship for domains relating to proportion of workers with job insecurity or migrant workers. By time there was a clear exposure-response relationship for these domains in the first period only. Results were largely consistent across the two UK cohorts.

Conclusions An exposure-response relationship exists in the early phase of the COVID-19 pandemic for number of contacts, nature of contacts, contacts via surfaces, indoor or outdoor location, ability to social distance and use of face coverings. These associations appear to have diminished over time."