Lower Incidence of Parvovirus-B19 Infections in Dutch Blood Donors during SARS-CoV-2 Pandemic

Microbiol Spectr. 2021 Oct 31;9(2):e0025321. doi: 10.1128/Spectrum.00253-21. Epub 2021 Sep 15.

Abstract

During the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, several studies reported a lower incidence of respiratory infections other than COVID-19 compared to previous years, but bias due to changes in uptake and capacity of non-COVID care cannot be excluded. The routine screening of Dutch blood donors remained unchanged during the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic and showed a significant reduction of silent parvovirus B19 (B19V) infections from 4.0/100,000 donations in 2013 to 2019 to 0.6/100,000 donations in 2020 and 0.0/100,000 donations in first 6 months of 2021.

Keywords: SARS-CoV-2; blood donor; parvovirus B19.

Publication types

  • Letter
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Asymptomatic Infections / epidemiology
  • Blood Donors / statistics & numerical data*
  • Blood Transfusion
  • COVID-19 / epidemiology*
  • Carrier State / virology
  • Humans
  • Netherlands / epidemiology
  • Parvoviridae Infections / epidemiology*
  • Parvoviridae Infections / transmission
  • Parvovirus B19, Human / isolation & purification*
  • SARS-CoV-2 / isolation & purification