Factors affecting compliance to non-pharmaceutical interventions
During the Covid-19 pandemic, social compliance with non-pharmaceutical interventions has varied within and across nations, and has generally decreased over time. This column uses data from 12 countries between March and December 2020 to show that trust in scientists plays a key role in compliance with and support for non-pharmaceutical interventions and willingness to get vaccinated, while trust in government has a more limited effect. However, when people associate scientists and scientific bodies with government action and political decision-making, it erodes their trust in these scientific institutions.
Trust in scientists amidst the pandemic: Panel evidence from 12 countries
By: Yann Algan, Daniel Cohen, Eva Davoine, Martial Foucault, Stefanie Stantcheva – Paris School of Economics, UC Berkeley, Sciences Po, Harvard University
How successful were the lockdown policies?
Early evidence suggests that shelter-in-place (SIP) policies slowed COVID-19 transmission early in the pandemic in the United States and globally. However, more recent studies suggest that individuals changed behavior in response to the severity of the pandemic and the enactment of SIP policy and as a result the effectiveness of such policies was put in question. In this paper Cantor et al. examine the impacts of SIP policies on excess mortality in 43 countries and in the U.S . They use the key measure of excess deaths, which compares deaths from all causes in a given geography at a given point in time to expected deaths from all causes based on historical data . They find that:
- Following the implementation of SIP policies, excess mortality increases. The increase in excess mortality is statistically significant in the immediate weeks following SIP implementation for the international comparison.
- There is not strong evidence that countries or U.S. states that implemented SIP policies earlier, and in which SIP policies had longer to operate, had lower excess deaths.
The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic and Policy Responses on Excess Mortality
Authors: Virat Agrawal, Jonathan H. Cantor, Neeraj Sood, Christopher M. Whaley
From: USC Sol Price School of Public Policy, RAND Corporation
Epidemiologists vs economists
During the COVID-19 pandemic policy makers sought the advice of economists and epidemiologists. They ended up receiving divergent policy recommendations which created uncertainty and confusion, and opened the door to disinformation, distrust of institutions, and politicization of scientific facts. Darden et al. argue that what accounts for the difference in policy recommendations is the fact that the models the two groups developed to inform policy tend to rely on different sets of assumptions. To bridge the gap, the authors convened a group of scholars from epidemiology, economics, and related fields (e.g., statistics, engineering, and health policy) to discuss approaches to modeling economy-wide pandemics.
Epidemiological models could, for example, be constructed that place more emphasis on individual behavior and preferences—while economic models could similarly be developed that incorporate greater consideration not only of disease spread itself, but also of specific health-related constraints.
Modeling to Inform Economy-Wide Pandemic Policy: Bringing Epidemiologists and Economists Together
Authors: Michael E. Darden, David Dowdy, Lauren Gardner, Barton Hamilton, Karen Kopecky, Melissa Marx, Nicholas W. Papageorge, Daniel Polsky, Kimberly Powers, Elizabeth Stuart, Matthew Zahn
From: Johns Hopkins University, Washington University in St. Louis, Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta
