| Methods |
Prospective cohort, surveillance study carried out to identify risk factors for development of SARS among quarantined persons in Taiwan. Two types of quarantine were implemented during the SARS outbreak in Taiwan: level A and level B quarantine. Level A quarantine was designed for persons who had known and, at times, had close exposure to persons infected with SARS in healthcare facilities and other community and domestic areas. Level B quarantine was designed for travellers who sat on the same flight within 3 rows of a person infected with SARS or were returning from World Health Organization–designated SARS‐affected areas |
| Participants |
During the study period 52,255 persons were placed under level A quarantine and 95,271 persons were placed under level B quarantine |
| Interventions |
Exposure to level A quarantine versus level B |
| Outcomes |
Laboratory:
Serological evidence: yes
Effectiveness:
SARS (definition not reported)
Safety: N/A |
| Notes |
The authors conclude that focusing quarantine efforts on persons with known or suspected exposure can greatly decrease the number of persons placed under quarantine, without substantially compromising its yield and effectiveness. This is an important study, as it implies that risk banding can increase effectiveness and efficiency of quarantine procedures. The risk of bias is high as most of the answers to the NOS items are clearly no, however it is very difficult to get answers to a question such as the effectiveness of quarantine using any other design |
| Risk of bias |
| Bias |
Authors' judgement |
Support for judgement |
| Random sequence generation (selection bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Allocation concealment (selection bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Blinding (performance bias and detection bias)
All outcomes |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Incomplete outcome data (attrition bias)
All outcomes |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
| Selective reporting (reporting bias) |
Unclear risk |
N/A |
