Thank you for your interest in the SwissCovid app.
On 1 April 2022, the COVID-19 Special Situation Ordinance was revoked. Consequently, the SwissCovid app has been discontinued, meaning that statistics will no longer be updated.
Maintenance of the SwissCovid app ceased on 31 August 2023. The indicators collected by the SwissCovid app monitoring will continue to be available on the FSO website and can be used for statistical purposes.
Further information:
Background
The purpose of the SwissCovid app is to stop COVID-19 from spreading further and to break the infection chain. The app complements the cantons’ conventional contact tracing of transmission chains.
Pursuant to Article 12 of the Ordinance on the Proximity Tracing System for Coronavirus SARS-COV-2 (OPTS), the Federal Office of Public Health will provide the Federal Statistical Office (FSO) with statistical data periodically and in fully anonymised form. The SwissCovid app will be deactivated with the expiry of the OPTS in accordance with Article 15. Fully anonymised data can continue to be used for statistical purposes. The FSO publishes the number of downloaded SwissCovid apps, the number of active SwissCovid apps, the days between the onset of symptoms and transmission of the covid code (for users who have entered the covid code), the number of covid codes entered, as well as the number of notifications to the SwissCovid infoline concerning app warnings about a possible infection (via telephone or web form). The data are updated on working days.
Depending on the indicator, the statistics contain data starting from the public release of the SwissCovid app on 25 June 2020 (at the earliest) until 31.03.2022. Data were updated daily from Monday to Friday at 14:00 based on data from the previous day(s).
Indicators
The SwissCovid app has been available to the public to download via the Apple and Google app stores since 28th May 2020 as a pilot version and since 25th June 2020 as a final version. The graph shows: the development of the number of active SwissCovid apps, the number of previously downloaded SwissCovid apps and the number of covid codes entered by users of the SwissCovid app, the days between onset of symptoms and transmission of the covid codes by users who entered the covid code, as well as the number of notifications to the SwissCovid infoline concerning app warnings about a possible infection. The number of entered covid codes is published with a time delay of two days. This means that codes are also counted when entered by users of the SwissCovid app only one day after issue by the cantonal health authorities.
Observation period
The release of the app on 25th June 2020 means data can be analysed based on the infrastructure of the app-based proximity tracing. For this purpose, the FSO has published the number of active SwissCovid apps on a daily basis since 26th June 2020. This figure provides information on how the SwissCovid app is used by the population on a daily basis. From 23rd July 2020 onwards, the number of active SwissCovid apps will be calculated using a new procedure. In addition, the number of downloads of the SwissCovid app and the number of covid codes entered by the app’s users are also be published. As of 12th October 2020, the number of days between onset of symptoms and transmission of the covid code by users who have entered the covid code is also published. The number of notifications to the SwissCovid infoline concerning app warnings about a possible infection has been published since 4th November 2020. As of calendar week 50/2020, prior to telephoning the infoline due to a possible infection, users are asked to read the web guidelines and to answer a few questions online. For this reason, as of 18th January 2021, the FSO publishes the total number of notifications by telephone or internet concerning app warnings about a possible infection to the SwissCovid infoline.
When the OPTS expires on 1 April 2022, in accordance with Article 15, data will no longer be collected or published.
Results
Methodology
Summary
The Federal Office of Information Technology, Systems and Telecommunication (FOITT) provides the FSO with daily figures on the number of downloaded and active SwissCovid apps. In addition, the daily number of covid codes entered by app users, the number of days between onset of symptoms and transmission of covid codes by users who entered the covid code, as well as the number of notifications to the infoline about app warnings about a possible infection are provided. The FSO informs the public about this using texts and graphs and makes the relevant data available to download.
Data source and data flow
The number of SwissCovid apps downloaded to date is reported to the FOITT by Apple and Google with a time delay of one to three days.
Until 22nd July 2020, the calculation of the number of active SwissCovid apps was based on the app’s automatic contact with the proximity tracing system to update the configuration data. This automatic contact takes place several times a day, enabling the number of active apps per day to be calculated. This number largely corresponds with the number of users of the app but may be lower for technical reasons. This is the case, for example, if apps are not permanently active or when mobile phones are switched off or not connected to a network.
Since 23rd July 2020, the calculated number of active SwissCovid apps is based on active apps which statistically make a dummy request to the proximity tracing system once every five days. These dummy requests are used to ensure data protection so that users who enter a covid code cannot be identified. The number of dummy requests is taken as a basis to calculate the active apps. This is more accurate than the automatic contact method previously used to update the configuration. Further methodology information on the previous and the new calculation method for the number of active SwissCovid Apps can be found here.
If the test result for the new coronavirus is positive, the cantonal authorities and in some cases doctors and pharmacies will send a covid code to persons who have tested positive and are using the app. If the covid code is entered into the app by the user, other app users who were exposed to a risk of infection are informed automatically and they receive the link to the guidelines and also the SwissCovid infoline's telephone number. The number of telephone calls to the infoline concerning app warnings about a possible infection is reported daily to the FOPH and then forwarded to the FOITT.
In the group of app users with a positive test result who then entered the covid codes they received, the days between onset of symptoms and transmission of covid codes is recorded. These numbers, like the daily number of covid codes entered by SwissCovid app users with a positive test result, are made availble to the FSO by the FOITT, as well as the number of active SwissCovid apps.
The FSO publishes these figures every day at 2 pm by means of texts, graphs and tables. Monitoring covers all people who have downloaded the SwissCovid app to their mobile phone from 25th June 2020 onwards.
The publication of these statistics will end with the expiry of the OPTS on 1 April 2022.
