Evaluation of the lockdowns for the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Italy and Spain after one month follow up

From the end of February, the SARS-CoV-2 epidemic in Spain has been following the footsteps of that in Italy very closely. We have analyzed the trends of incident cases, deaths, and intensive care unit admissions (ICU) in both countries before and after their respective national lockdowns using an interrupted time-series design. Data was analyzed with quasi-Poisson regression using an interaction model to estimate the change in trends. After the first lockdown, incidence trends were considerably reduced in both countries. However, although the slopes have been flattened for all outcomes, the trends kept rising. During the second lockdown, implementing more restrictive measures for mobility, it has been a change in the trend slopes for both countries in daily incident cases and ICUs. This improvement indicates that the efforts overtaken are being successful in flattening the epidemic curve, and reinforcing the belief that we must hold on. (C) 2020 Published by Elsevier B.V.