scholarly journals The "Great Lockdown": Inactive Workers and Mortality by Covid-19

Author(s):  
Nicola Borri ◽  
Francesco Drago ◽  
Chiara Santantonio ◽  
Francesco Sobbrio

In response to the Covid-19 outbreak, among other previous ``non-pharmaceutical interventions'', on March 22, 2020 the Italian Government imposed an economic lockdown and ordered the closing of all non-essential economic activities. This paper estimates the causal effect of this measure on mortality by Covid-19 and on mobility patterns. The identification of the causal effect exploits the variation in the number of active workers across municipalities induced by the economic lockdown. The difference-in-difference empirical design compares outcomes in municipalities above and below the median variation in the share of active population before and after the lockdown within a province, also controlling for municipality-specific dynamics, daily-shocks at the provincial level and municipal unobserved characteristics. Our results show that the intensity of the economic lockdown is associated to a statistically significant reduction in mortality by Covid-19 and, in particular, for age groups between 40-64 and older. Back of the envelope calculations indicate that 4,793 deaths were avoided, in the 26 days between April 5 to April 30, in the 3,518 municipalities which experienced a more intense lockdown. Assuming linearity, a 1 percentage point reduction in the share of active population caused a 1.32 percentage points reduction in mortality by Covid-19. We also find that the economic lockdown, as expected, led to a reduction in human mobility. Several robustness checks corroborate our empirical findings.

Author(s):  
Shuhei Nomura ◽  
Yuta Tanoue ◽  
Daisuke Yoneoka ◽  
Stuart Gilmour ◽  
Takayuki Kawashima ◽  
...  

AbstractIn the COVID-19 era, movement restrictions are crucial to slow virus transmission and have been implemented in most parts of the world, including Japan. To find new insights on human mobility and movement restrictions encouraged (but not forced) by the emergency declaration in Japan, we analyzed mobility data at 35 major stations and downtown areas in Japan—each defined as an area overlaid by several 125-meter grids—from September 1, 2019 to March 19, 2021. Data on the total number of unique individuals per hour passing through each area were obtained from Yahoo Japan Corporation (i.e., more than 13,500 data points for each area). We examined the temporal trend in the ratio of the rolling seven-day daily average of the total population to a baseline on January 16, 2020, by ten-year age groups in five time frames. We demonstrated that the degree and trend of mobility decline after the declaration of a state of emergency varies across age groups and even at the subregional level. We demonstrated that monitoring dynamic geographic and temporal mobility information stratified by detailed population characteristics can help guide not only exit strategies from an ongoing emergency declaration, but also initial response strategies before the next possible resurgence. Combining such detailed data with data on vaccination coverage and COVID-19 incidence (including the status of the health care delivery system) can help governments and local authorities develop community-specific mobility restriction policies. This could include strengthening incentives to stay home and raising awareness of cognitive errors that weaken people's resolve to refrain from nonessential movement.


2019 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 485-498 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jordi Muñoz ◽  
Eva Anduiza

Social movements often face tactic diversification. In otherwise nonviolent movements, some groups or radical flanks may resort to violent actions such as street rioting. This article analyzes the impact that these violent episodes can have on popular support for the movement as a whole. To estimate the causal effect of violence, it exploits an unexpected riot outbreak that occurred during the fieldwork of a face-to-face survey in Barcelona in May 2016, led by a squat group linked to the anti-austerity movement known as the 15-M or indignados that emerged during the financial crisis. By comparing respondents interviewed before and after the riots, it finds that the street violence episode reduced support for the 15-M movement by 12 percentage points on average. However, the magnitude of the effect is highly conditional on the respondents’ predispositions towards the movement. Core supporters, that are expected to share the frame of the movement in justifying violent actions, are the least affected by the violent outbreak. On the other extreme, weak supporters, opposers, and non-aligned citizens reduce their support to a larger extent. Results are robust to different specifications and a wide range of robustness checks. These findings have potentially important implications for movements concerned with broadening their support base.


2020 ◽  
Vol 12 (1) ◽  
pp. 325-358
Author(s):  
Li Liu

In 2009, the United Kingdom changed from a worldwide to a territorial tax system, abolishing dividend taxes on foreign repatriation from many low-tax countries. This paper assesses the causal effect of territorial taxation on real investments, using a unique dataset for multinational affiliates in 27 European countries and employing the difference-in-differences approach. It finds that the territorial reform has increased the investment rate of UK multinationals by 16.7 percentage points in low-tax countries. In the absence of any significant investment reduction elsewhere, the findings represent a likely increase in total outbound investment by UK multinationals. (JEL F23, G31, H25, H32, H87)


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandro Spelta ◽  
Paolo Pagnottoni

AbstractMobility restrictions have been identified as key non-pharmaceutical interventions to limit the spread of the SARS-COV-2 epidemics. However, these interventions present significant drawbacks to the social fabric and negative outcomes for the real economy. In this paper we propose a real-time monitoring framework for tracking the economic consequences of various forms of mobility reductions involving European countries. We adopt a granular representation of mobility patterns during both the first and second waves of SARS-COV-2 in Italy, Germany, France and Spain to provide an analytical characterization of the rate of losses of industrial production by means of a nowcasting methodology. Our approach exploits the information encoded in massive datasets of human mobility provided by Facebook and Google, which are published at higher frequencies than the target economic variables, in order to obtain an early estimate before the official data becomes available. Our results show, in first place, the ability of mobility-related policies to induce a contraction of mobility patterns across jurisdictions. Besides this contraction, we observe a substitution effect which increases mobility within jurisdictions. Secondly, we show how industrial production strictly follows the dynamics of population commuting patterns and of human mobility trends, which thus provide information on the day-by-day variations in countries’ economic activities. Our work, besides shedding light on how policy interventions targeted to induce a mobility contraction impact the real economy, constitutes a practical toolbox for helping governments to design appropriate and balanced policy actions aimed at containing the SARS-COV-2 spread, while mitigating the detrimental effect on the economy. Our study reveals how complex mobility patterns can have unequal consequences to economic losses across countries and call for a more tailored implementation of restrictions to balance the containment of contagion with the need to sustain economic activities.


2014 ◽  
Vol 18 (6) ◽  
pp. 54-62
Author(s):  
G. V. Ohromiy ◽  
N.U. Makarova ◽  
A.M. Kasyuha

Purpose: scientific rationale approaches Express-diagnostics for athletes of taekwondo section by psychophysiological parameters. Material: Total surveyed 84 people, including 68 boys and 16 girls. Were defined backup capabilities, exercise tolerance and selection of adequate individual dose of loads in preparation for the international competition, participants - taekwondo athletes. Was attended by representatives of Ukraine, Russia and Lithuania. Age groups of participants: 6 - 16 years. Athletes have different levels and different schools of training. Results: evaluation of exercise tolerance and definition of an adequate level of motor mode in taekwondo athletes in terms of the difference of lability (DL) before and after training, revealed: high and very high nervous system (NS) lability. These figures correspond to high and very high tolerance to physical loads. The respondents who had difference of liability (DL) <0, were well-trained athletes and their high points of strength of nervous system testified about good backup capabilities (withstand great and continuous loads). In 78 % of the tested load was chosen adequately. Less than 20% of the respondents noted the average backup capabilities. They need individual correction dose loads to increase adaptive capacity. Insignificant 10%, the share of respondents had low exercise tolerance at the average values NS strength, which indicates a good backup capabilities. The direct dependence: respondents with high levels on state of health, activity and mood - low levels of anxiety, frustration, aggression and rigidity. Conclusions The proposed optimized approach Express-diagnostics according to psychophysiological parameters allow you to determine the level of physical endurance, speed adaptation athletes in the sections taekwondo and adequate response to the loads.


2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Valentina Pieroni ◽  
Angelo Facchini ◽  
Massimo Riccaboni

AbstractThis paper analyzes the impact of mobility contraction on employee furlough and excess deaths in Italy during the COVID-19 crisis. Our approach exploits rainfall patterns across Italian administrative regions as a source of exogenous variation in human mobility to pinpoint the causal effect of mobility restrictions on excess deaths and furlough workers. Results confirm that the first countrywide lockdown has effectively curtailed the COVID-19 epidemics restricting it mainly to the northern part of the country, with the drawback of a countrywide increase in unemployment risk. Our analysis points out that a mobility contraction of 1% leads to a mortality reduction of 0.6%, but it induces an increase of 10% in Wage Guarantee Funds allowed hours. We discuss return-to-work policies and prioritizing policies for administering COVID-19 vaccines in the most advanced stage of a vaccination campaign when the healthy active population is left to be vaccinated.


2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (1) ◽  
pp. 118-122
Author(s):  
Vidya Bhagat

Background: The Psychotherapy can be effective in prolonging periods free of depression in early senescent has been focused on the study. People refused medication agreed to come for psychotherapy are treated to get free from their depressive symptom. The main objective of the study was therefore using psychotherapy as a treatment module to stretch time free of depression. Further psycho education to give more information on depression and increase patient flexibility for the combination of anti-depressant with psychotherapy when needed.Methodology: The subjects selected for the study were 60 patients from ‘Nitte Rural Psychiatry Clinic’ Nitte Mangalore Karnataka, India. They were selected by random sampling technique. Medico-Psychological questionnaire for general neuroticism was administered to find out the extent of depression before and after psychotherapy. To find the difference between the age and depression before and after psychotherapy Carl Pearson’s Correlation coefficient method was carried out.Results: The results reveal that a non-significant difference between age groups with extent of depression in different age group of early senescent before and after psychotherapy (Chi-square=1.7913, p>0.05) at the 5 % level of significance and (Chi-square=2.4485, p>0.05) at the 5 % level of significance respectively. Further the Comparison of extent of depression before and after psychotherapy in 50-55, 56-60 age groups and as a total by Wilcoxon matched pairs test has been administered and the result reveals that significant differences between extent of depression before and after psychotherapy in 50-55yrs of age group (Z=2.5205, p<0.05) at the 5 % level of significance, 56-60yrs of age group (Z=2.2014, p<0.05) at the 5 % level of significance. It means that, the significant means that, the significance of 15.7%, 10.5%depression was decreased before and after psychotherapy respectively. A significant difference was observed between extent of depression before and after psychotherapy in 50-60yrs of age group (Z=3. 2958, p<0.05) at the 5 % level of significance. It means that, the significance of 13.0% depression was decreased after psychotherapy.Conclusion: The implication of this study was to develop insight and understanding among the clinicians that importance psychotherapy as treatment of depression.Bangladesh Journal of Medical Science Vol.15(1) 2016 p.118-122


Author(s):  
K. Diwakar ◽  
Y. Sailaja ◽  
V. Palanivel ◽  
Shaik Baba Fakruddin ◽  
T. Gangadhara ◽  
...  

Prospective study on the comparison of mydiriatic effect of Tropicamide 0.8% and Phenylephrine 5% in teenagers and geriatric people was carried out in suthrama Eye Hospital madanapalle, India. The main objective of this study was to compare the mydriatic effect of a combination of drug in teenagers and geriatric people. It also evaluated the ADR’s produced and the efficacy of the drug in two age groups. In this study population majority of the subjects were female in group A and male in group B. Among the whole population under study in group A and B no one has reported with any case of congenital anomalies. A number of ADR’s are reported but no serious adverse events had occurred. The study was carried out in 100 eyes ie. 50 subjects whom are divided into 2 groups based on age. The comparison of mydriatic effect was done in each group after instilling one drop of a combination of 0.08% Tropicamide and 0.5% Phenynilephrine. The pupillary size where measured before and after administration of drug and the results were compared. The results showed that there is a large difference in the normal pupil size between teenagers and geriatric people. After dilation the difference in pupil size was statistically significant among the two groups. The study concludes that the pupillary dilation produced by administering 0.8% Tropicamide and 5% Phenylephrine produces higher mydriatic effect in teenagers than geriatric people.


Author(s):  
Rajani A. Dable ◽  
Pradnya B. Wasnik ◽  
Babita R. Pawar ◽  
Sujit S. Bopardikar ◽  
Sunilkumar N. Nagmode

Purpose: The aim of this study was to analyze the smoking prevalence among dental students and to assess the need for promoting tobacco education and intervention by exploring their knowledge about smoking related risk factors. The study also examined the attitudes and practices of the students toward tobacco consumption, and their responsibilities toward the community. Methods: In total, 53 male students participated in the study (21 juniors and 32 seniors). The training program was divided into three modules, and the questionnaire was administered before and after the counseling sessions, which provided the comparative data on the students’ views about smoking cessation. Results: The most commonly practiced mode of tobacco consumption was found to be cigarette smoking (90.6 %), while a few consumed Gutkha (9.4%). All the junior students (100%) reported to have been benefitted by the counseling program, while 68.8% of the students from the senior group reported the same. Bivariate statistical analysis was conducted using the Pearson’s chi-square test for testing the difference across the age groups. P-values less than 0.05 were considered statistically significant. Conclusion: Curbing tobacco influence on dental students in their initial days can ensure a smoke-free life for them, as well as prevents them from feeling embarrassed or experiencing a lack of confidence while seeing their patients. Thus, tobacco education and intervention programs can motivate the students and increase their potential to be credible advisors regarding smoking cessation.


2014 ◽  
Vol 95 (3) ◽  
pp. 531-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi Tan ◽  
Tommy Tsan-Yuk Lam ◽  
Chunli Wu ◽  
Shui-shan Lee ◽  
Cécile Viboud ◽  
...  

The drivers of influenza seasonality remain heavily debated, especially in tropical/subtropical regions where influenza activity can peak in winter, during the rainy season, or remain constant throughout the year. We compared the epidemiological and evolutionary patterns of seasonal influenza epidemics in Hong Kong and Shenzhen, two adjacent cities in subtropical southern China. This comparison represents a unique natural experiment, as connectivity between these two cities has increased over the past decade. We found that, whilst summer influenza epidemics in Shenzhen used to peak 1–3 months later than those in Hong Kong, the difference decreased after 2005 (P<0.0001). Phylogenetic analysis revealed that influenza isolates from Shenzhen have become genetically closer to those circulating in Hong Kong over time (P = 0.045). Furthermore, although Shenzhen isolates used to be more distant from the global putative source of influenza viruses than isolates from Hong Kong (P<0.001), this difference has narrowed (P = 0.02). Overall, our study reveals that influenza activities show remarkably distinct epidemiological and evolutionary patterns in adjacent subtropical cities and suggests that human mobility patterns can play a major role in influenza dynamics in the subtropics.


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