TY - JOUR
T1 - Policy Stringency, Handwashing and COVID-19 cases: Evidence from Global dataset
AU - Dzator, Janet
AU - Acheampong, Alex O.
AU - Dzator, Michael
AU - Paolucci, Francesco
AU - Yawe, Bruno Lule
AU - Asmah, Emmanuel Ekow
AU - Andoh, Francis Kwaw
AU - Kabagenyi, Allen
AU - Gillespie, James
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was supported by the Australia Africa Universities Network's (AAUN) 2019 Partnership Research and Development Fund (PRDF) and the University of Newcastle [Grant number G1900649].
Funding Information:
The authors are grateful to the Australia Africa Universities Network and the University of Newcastle for funding this research. The authors sincerely thank the editor and the two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments that help to improve the quality of this paper.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 Fellowship of Postgraduate Medicine
PY - 2022/6
Y1 - 2022/6
N2 - Objective: Since the COVID-19 pandemic, many governments globally have introduced policy measures to contain the spread of the virus. Popular COVID-19 containment measures include lockdowns of various forms (aggregated into government response stringency index [GRSI]) and handwashing (HWF). The effectiveness of these policy measures remains unclear in the academic literature. This study, therefore, examines the effect of government policy stringency and handwashing on total daily reported COVID-19 cases.Method: We use a comprehensive dataset of 176 countries to investigate the effect of government policy stringency and handwashing on daily reported COVID-19 cases. In this study, we apply the Lewbel (2012) two-stage least squares technique to control endogeneity. Results: Our results indicated that GRSI significantly contributes to the increase in the total and new confirmed cases of COVI-19. Sensitivity analyses revealed that the 1st, 4th, and 5th quintiles of GRIS significantly reduce total confirmed cases of COVID-19. Also, the result indicated that while the 1st quintile of GRIS contributes significantly to reducing the new confirmed cases of COVID-19, the 3rd, 4th, and 5th quintiles of GRSI contribute significantly to increasing the new confirmed cases of COVID-19. The results indicated that HWF reduces total and new confirmed cases of COVID-19; however, such effect is not robust to income and regional effects. Nonlinear analysis revealed that while GRSI has an inverted U-shaped relationship with total and new confirmed cases of COVID-19, HWF has a U-shaped relationship.Conclusion: We suggest that policymakers should focus on raising awareness and full engagement of all members of society in implementing public health policies rather than using stringent lockdown measures.
AB - Objective: Since the COVID-19 pandemic, many governments globally have introduced policy measures to contain the spread of the virus. Popular COVID-19 containment measures include lockdowns of various forms (aggregated into government response stringency index [GRSI]) and handwashing (HWF). The effectiveness of these policy measures remains unclear in the academic literature. This study, therefore, examines the effect of government policy stringency and handwashing on total daily reported COVID-19 cases.Method: We use a comprehensive dataset of 176 countries to investigate the effect of government policy stringency and handwashing on daily reported COVID-19 cases. In this study, we apply the Lewbel (2012) two-stage least squares technique to control endogeneity. Results: Our results indicated that GRSI significantly contributes to the increase in the total and new confirmed cases of COVI-19. Sensitivity analyses revealed that the 1st, 4th, and 5th quintiles of GRIS significantly reduce total confirmed cases of COVID-19. Also, the result indicated that while the 1st quintile of GRIS contributes significantly to reducing the new confirmed cases of COVID-19, the 3rd, 4th, and 5th quintiles of GRSI contribute significantly to increasing the new confirmed cases of COVID-19. The results indicated that HWF reduces total and new confirmed cases of COVID-19; however, such effect is not robust to income and regional effects. Nonlinear analysis revealed that while GRSI has an inverted U-shaped relationship with total and new confirmed cases of COVID-19, HWF has a U-shaped relationship.Conclusion: We suggest that policymakers should focus on raising awareness and full engagement of all members of society in implementing public health policies rather than using stringent lockdown measures.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85119116794&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1016/j.hlpt.2021.100574
DO - 10.1016/j.hlpt.2021.100574
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85119116794
SN - 2211-8837
VL - 11
JO - Health Policy And Technology
JF - Health Policy And Technology
IS - 2
M1 - 100574
ER -
