- A study discovered a clear link between stronger governmental actions to prevent COVID-19 transmission and fewer disease-related fatalities.
- Being next to a state that imposed fewer interventions, on the other hand, tended to negate the benefits of robust control measures.
- Travel between countries with strict rules and those with lax regulations may account for a portion of the effect.
- According to the experts who conducted the study, a better coordinated federal response to the epidemic would have saved more lives.
Around the time the World Health Organization (WHO) proclaimed COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11, 2020, countries including China, South Korea, Singapore, Japan, and several European countries had already implemented countrywide control measures.
By contrast, the United States government took no federal action to halt the spread of the illness in 2020. Rather than that, individual states choose when and how to use control measures such as prohibiting public gatherings, shutting schools, and issuing stay-at-home orders. Maintain awareness of the current COVID-19 epidemic by subscribing to our live updates and visiting our coronavirus portal for further preventive and treatment information.
Between March 2020 and March 2021, researchers examined the effectiveness of these state-level “non-pharmaceutical treatments” (NPIs). They published their preliminary findings, which have not yet been peer-reviewed, in a preprint on medRxiv.
The research was conducted in conjunction with the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and the Carnegie Mellon University Department of Statistics and Data Science in Pittsburgh, PA.
Incomprehensible loss
In the United States, about 620,000 people have died with COVID-19.
“In light of this incomprehensible loss, there is a chance to learn more about how certain NPIs may impact COVID-19 transmission in the United States,” the scientists write.
They began by developing a framework for categorizing the rigor of metrics into five categories:
- instructions to remain at home
- business limitations that are not necessary
- prohibitions on indoor gatherings
- Restriction on restaurants/bars
- Mandatory mask/face covering
They gathered information regarding control measures and their evolution through time from the websites of all 50 states and the District of Columbia’s state governments and governors.
Their research indicated a link between greater statewide interventions and fewer fatalities, albeit additional actions required at least two weeks to have an effect on case counts.
“Our data clearly demonstrate a negative correlation between NPI scores and COVID-19 deaths, with states with a higher NPI having fewer COVID-19 deaths,” said senior author Seema S. Lakdawala, Ph.D., an associate professor of microbiology and molecular genetics at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
“In light of this, I believe that a coordinated federal approach would have saved lives and established a minimum NPI standard for states,” she told.
Travel’s potential consequences
Surprisingly, adjacent states’ case counts tended to follow similar patterns throughout this 12-month period, even when the quality of their treatments varied.
“We observed that some groupings of states, such as those in the Midwest, had similar patterns in case of counts, despite the fact that their mitigation methods were different,” says Rebecca Nugent, Ph.D., a Carnegie Mellon professor of statistics and co-author of the study.
The researchers believe that this might be explained by parallels in climate or demography across adjacent states, or by cross-state tourism.
“Our study did not include an examination of interstate travel. We did discover, however, that adjacent states had comparable COVID-19 case curves even when their NPI limits were different,” Prof. Lakdawala explained.
“This might have occurred as a result of interstate travel or similar climates,” she continued.
This, she added, implies that adjacent states’ control actions should be coordinated to limit case numbers in future epidemics.
A study scheduled for 2020
Inconsistency in control measures across counties and states may incentivize individuals to drive further to attend church or a gym, for example.
Increased travel from counties with a high COVID-19 prevalence may result in an increase in case of numbers crossing the border into jurisdictions with fewer control measures in place.
“In the most extreme situations, people who violate regulations by traveling to neighboring jurisdictions can spark epidemics when an outbreak would have been contained otherwise,” the 2020 study’s authors wrote.