PGPH-D-23-00439

Infection prevention and control measures to reduce the transmission of mpox: a systematic review

PLOS Global Public Health

Dear Rebecca Kuehn,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Global Public Health. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Global Public Health’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

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Reviewer's comments are attached

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Please submit your revised manuscript by 10 August 2023. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at globalpubhealth@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pgph/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Sukanta Chowdhury, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS Global Public Health

Journal Requirements:

1. Please provide separate figure files in .tif or .eps format.

For more information about figure files please see our guidelines:

https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/s/figures 

https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/s/figures#loc-file-requirements

2. Please send a completed 'Competing Interests' statement, including any COIs declared by your co-authors. If you have no competing interests to declare, please state "The authors have declared that no competing interests exist".

3. Please provide a/amend your detailed Financial Disclosure statement. This is published with the article. It must therefore be completed in full sentences and contain the exact wording you wish to be published.

a. State the initials, alongside each funding source, of each author to receive each grant.

b. State what role the funders took in the study. If the funders had no role in your study, please state: “The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.”

4. Please update the Funding Information in the system to reflect the details included in your updated Financial Disclosure Statement.

5. We do not publish any copyright or trademark symbols that usually accompany proprietary names, eg (R), (C), or TM  (e.g. next to drug or reagent names). Please remove all instances of trademark/copyright symbols throughout the text, including ® on Appendix.

6. We notice that your supplementary [figures/tables/Appendix] are included in the manuscript file. Please remove them and upload them with the file type 'Supporting Information'. Please ensure that each Supporting Information file has a legend listed in the manuscript after the references list.

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

The manuscript is informative. I have added few more specific comments with reviewer that need to address.

Specific comments:

1. Abstract: Authors have mentioned the objective as “To assess the effectiveness of respiratory interventions…” As this is a review manuscript, authors have no scope to assess the effectiveness. Authors can use alternative words (e.g. review, summarize) instead of “assess”.

2. Abstract: Though the main objective was to assess the effectiveness of intervention but no information was included in result section about intervention.

3. Abstract: Transmission through inhalation is not reported as a single route. Why you suggested to wear medical mask to reduce transmission.

4. Introduction: No references are included. Why?

5. Methods: Please check the exclusion criteria. How many exclusion criteria did you consider? Any of the criteria?

6. Use reference for WHO Clinical Management and Infection Prevention and Control guideline

7. Provide a definition for “suspected case of mpox infection”.

8. Page 8: Data synthesis: “What is the proportion of new incident cases…...” Is it new cases or 2ndary cases? Why no cohort studies were considered for “What is the infectious period of mpox, disaggregated by route of transmission?”

9. Page 9: These following sentences are mentioned in method section.

“No randomized controlled trials or observational comparative studies were identified that directly informed any of the IPC review questions. No studies concerning mpox-like viruses met the inclusion criteria.” Avoid repeated information.

10. Page 10: the footnotes c and d are not properly identified

11. Page 11: the footnotes c and d are not properly identified

12. Table 3, 4 and 5: It is better to mention the study number.

13. Page 17: Inferred odds ratioc: 1 : Is it suggested by a study or is it your interpretation? If it its resulted from other study, please add reference.

14. Page 17: Which term is more appropriate? Incident cases or 2ndary cases? Human-human transmission is not always required for Incident cases.

15. Discussion: First paragraph: This is useful if you add some logics that support direct physical sexual contact increase the risk of mpox transmission.

16. Discussion: no discussion for suggested interventions to reduce mpox transmission. Please add a paragraph for that.

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Global Public Health’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Partly

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2. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: N/A

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3. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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4. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Global Public Health does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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5. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: Please find comments to the manuscript embedded in the attachment. The areas that are commented are highlighted.

For my response to Review Question 2, the authors could highlight in Discussion that uncertainties exist in the numeric results even though these uncertainties are hard to be quantified.

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6. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: Yes: Dehao Chen

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: PGPH-D-23-00439_reviewer.pdf

Attachment

Submitted filename: PGPH-D-23-00439_Editor comments.docx

PGPH-D-23-00439R1

Infection prevention and control measures to reduce the transmission of mpox: a systematic review

PLOS Global Public Health

Dear Dr. Rebecca Kuehn,

Thank you for submitting your manuscript to PLOS Global Public Health. After careful consideration, we feel that it has merit but does not fully meet PLOS Global Public Health’s publication criteria as it currently stands. Therefore, we invite you to submit a revised version of the manuscript that addresses the points raised during the review process.

Please submit your revised manuscript by 14 December 2023. If you will need more time than this to complete your revisions, please reply to this message or contact the journal office at globalpubhealth@plos.org. When you're ready to submit your revision, log on to https://www.editorialmanager.com/pgph/ and select the 'Submissions Needing Revision' folder to locate your manuscript file.

Please include the following items when submitting your revised manuscript:

• A rebuttal letter that responds to each point raised by the editor and reviewer(s). You should upload this letter as a separate file labeled 'Response to Reviewers'.
• A marked-up copy of your manuscript that highlights changes made to the original version. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Revised Manuscript with Track Changes'.
• An unmarked version of your revised paper without tracked changes. You should upload this as a separate file labeled 'Manuscript'.

Guidelines for resubmitting your figure files are available below the reviewer comments at the end of this letter.

We look forward to receiving your revised manuscript.

Kind regards,

Sukanta Chowdhury, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS Global Public Health

Journal Requirements:

1. Please update your online Competing Interests statement. If you have no competing interests to declare, please state: “The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.”

2. Please ensure that you refer to Figure 1 in your text as, if accepted, production will need this reference to link the reader to the figure.

3. Please include a separate legend for Figure 1 in your manuscript.

4. Please ensure that you cite or refer to Tables 2 and 3 in your text as, if accepted, production will need these references to link the reader to the tables.

5. We notice that your supplementary materials are included in the manuscript file. Please remove them and upload them with the file type 'Supporting Information'. Please ensure that each Supporting Information file has a legend listed in the manuscript after the references list.

6. Please add a full list of legends for all your Supporting Information files after the References list.

7. Please review your reference list to ensure that it is complete and correct. If you have cited papers that have been retracted, please include the rationale for doing so in the manuscript text, or remove these references and replace them with relevant current references. Any changes to the reference list should be mentioned in the rebuttal letter that accompanies your revised manuscript. If you need to cite a retracted article, indicate the article’s retracted status in the References list and also include a citation and full reference for the retraction notice.

Additional Editor Comments (if provided):

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Reviewers' comments:

Reviewer's Responses to Questions

Comments to the Author

1. If the authors have adequately addressed your comments raised in a previous round of review and you feel that this manuscript is now acceptable for publication, you may indicate that here to bypass the “Comments to the Author” section, enter your conflict of interest statement in the “Confidential to Editor” section, and submit your "Accept" recommendation.

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

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2. Does this manuscript meet PLOS Global Public Health’s publication criteria? Is the manuscript technically sound, and do the data support the conclusions? The manuscript must describe methodologically and ethically rigorous research with conclusions that are appropriately drawn based on the data presented.

Reviewer #1: Partly

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3. Has the statistical analysis been performed appropriately and rigorously?

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

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4. Have the authors made all data underlying the findings in their manuscript fully available (please refer to the Data Availability Statement at the start of the manuscript PDF file)?

The PLOS Data policy requires authors to make all data underlying the findings described in their manuscript fully available without restriction, with rare exception. The data should be provided as part of the manuscript or its supporting information, or deposited to a public repository. For example, in addition to summary statistics, the data points behind means, medians and variance measures should be available. If there are restrictions on publicly sharing data—e.g. participant privacy or use of data from a third party—those must be specified.

Reviewer #1: (No Response)

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5. Is the manuscript presented in an intelligible fashion and written in standard English?

PLOS Global Public Health does not copyedit accepted manuscripts, so the language in submitted articles must be clear, correct, and unambiguous. Any typographical or grammatical errors should be corrected at revision, so please note any specific errors here.

Reviewer #1: Yes

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6. Review Comments to the Author

Please use the space provided to explain your answers to the questions above. You may also include additional comments for the author, including concerns about dual publication, research ethics, or publication ethics. (Please upload your review as an attachment if it exceeds 20,000 characters)

Reviewer #1: The authors have put significant effort in addressing comments raised from the initial round of the revision. Nonetheless, there are issues arise from the current revision that needs to be resolved before the manuscript being accepted. Please refer to the comments in the attached file and their corresponding highlighted sections.

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7. PLOS authors have the option to publish the peer review history of their article (what does this mean?). If published, this will include your full peer review and any attached files.

Do you want your identity to be public for this peer review? If you choose “no”, your identity will remain anonymous but your review may still be made public.

For information about this choice, including consent withdrawal, please see our Privacy Policy.

Reviewer #1: No

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[NOTE: If reviewer comments were submitted as an attachment file, they will be attached to this email and accessible via the submission site. Please log into your account, locate the manuscript record, and check for the action link "View Attachments". If this link does not appear, there are no attachment files.]

While revising your submission, please upload your figure files to the Preflight Analysis and Conversion Engine (PACE) digital diagnostic tool, https://pacev2.apexcovantage.com/. PACE helps ensure that figures meet PLOS requirements. To use PACE, you must first register as a user. Registration is free. Then, login and navigate to the UPLOAD tab, where you will find detailed instructions on how to use the tool. If you encounter any issues or have any questions when using PACE, please email PLOS at figures@plos.org. Please note that Supporting Information files do not need this step.

Attachments

Attachment

Submitted filename: PGPH-D-23-00439_R1_main_feedback.pdf

Infection prevention and control measures to reduce the transmission of mpox: a systematic review

PGPH-D-23-00439R2

Dear Rebecca Kuehn,

We are pleased to inform you that your manuscript 'Infection prevention and control measures to reduce the transmission of mpox: a systematic review' has been provisionally accepted for publication in PLOS Global Public Health.

Before your manuscript can be formally accepted you will need to complete some formatting changes, which you will receive in a follow up email. A member of our team will be in touch with a set of requests.

Please note that your manuscript will not be scheduled for publication until you have made the required changes, so a swift response is appreciated.

IMPORTANT: The editorial review process is now complete. PLOS will only permit corrections to spelling, formatting or significant scientific errors from this point onwards. Requests for major changes, or any which affect the scientific understanding of your work, will cause delays to the publication date of your manuscript.

If your institution or institutions have a press office, please notify them about your upcoming paper to help maximize its impact. If they'll be preparing press materials, please inform our press team as soon as possible -- no later than 48 hours after receiving the formal acceptance. Your manuscript will remain under strict press embargo until 2 pm Eastern Time on the date of publication. For more information, please contact globalpubhealth@plos.org.

Thank you again for supporting Open Access publishing; we are looking forward to publishing your work in PLOS Global Public Health.

Best regards,

Sukanta Chowdhury, Ph.D

Academic Editor

PLOS Global Public Health

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Reviewer Comments (if any, and for reference):