Prioritization of COVID-19 risk factors in July 2020 and February 2021 in the UK

BACKGROUND: Risk for COVID-19 positivity and hospitalization due to diverse environmental and sociodemographic factors may change as the pandemic progresses. METHODS: We investigated the association of 360 exposures sampled before COVID-19 outcomes for participants in the UK Biobank, including 9268 and 38,837 non-overlapping participants, sampled at July 17, 2020 and February 2, 2021, respectively. The 360 exposures included clinical biomarkers (e.g., BMI), health indicators (e.g., doctor-diagnosed diabetes), and environmental/behavioral variables (e.g., air pollution) measured 10–14 years before the COVID-19 time periods. RESULTS: Here we show, for example, “participant having son and/or daughter in household” was associated with an increase in incidence from 20% to 32% (risk difference of 12%) between timepoints. Furthermore, we find age to be increasingly associated with COVID-19 positivity over time from Risk Ratio [RR] (per 10-year age increase) of 0.81 to 0.6 (hospitalization RR from 1.18 to 2.63, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: Our data-driven approach demonstrates that time of pandemic plays a role in identifying risk factors associated with positivity and hospitalization.