Successful control of COVID-19 outbreak through tracing, testing, and isolation: Lessons learned from the outbreak control efforts made in a metropolitan city of South Korea

• Main Authors: Seung-Ji Kang, Sooyeon Kim, Kyung-Hwa Park, Sook In Jung, Min-Ho Shin, Sun-Seog Kweon, Hyang Park, Seong-Woo Choi, Eungyu Lee, So Yeon Ryu
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Elsevier 2021-09-01
• Series: Journal of Infection and Public Health
• Subjects: COVID-19; SARS-CoV-2; Contact tracing; Testing; Isolation
• Online Access: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1876034121001908
• ISSN: 1876-0341

The first surge of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) cases began on June 27, 2020 in Gwangju metropolitan city, located in the southwestern part of South Korea, with a population of 1,501,000. Local governments and the Korean Center for Disease Control and Prevention immediately started an epidemiologic investigation and traced the contacts of patients using a wide variety of data sources, including location data from mobile devices, credit card transaction, and closed-circuit television footage. Until July 16, 2020, 138 community transmission cases and 10 infection clusters were identified across the city. Through contact tracing, epidemiologic relatedness was found in 136 (98.6%) of 138 cases. Our investigation showed how the extensive and meticulous contact tracing suppressed COVID-19 outbreak in a populated city.