How effective are social distancing policies? Evidence on the fight against COVID-19

Ulrich Glogowsky; Emanuel Hansen; Simeon Schächtele

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0257363

How effective are social distancing policies? Evidence on the fight against COVID-19

PLoS One. 2021 Sep 22;16(9):e0257363. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0257363. eCollection 2021.

Authors

Ulrich Glogowsky¹, Emanuel Hansen², Simeon Schächtele³

Affiliations

¹ Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Linz, Austria.
² Center for Macroeconomic Research, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany.
³ Inter-American Development Bank, Washington, D.C., United States of America.

Abstract

To fight the spread of COVID-19, many countries implemented social distancing policies. This is the first paper that examines the effects of the German social distancing policies on behavior and the epidemic's spread. Exploiting the staggered timing of COVID-19 outbreaks in extended event-study models, we find that the policies heavily reduced mobility and contagion. In comparison to a no-social-distancing benchmark, within three weeks, the policies avoided 84% of the potential COVID-19 cases (point estimate: 499.3K) and 66% of the potential fatalities (5.4K). The policies' relative effects were smaller for individuals above 60 and in rural areas.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

COVID-19 / epidemiology
COVID-19 / prevention & control*
COVID-19 / transmission
Health Policy*
Humans
Outcome Assessment, Health Care*
Physical Distancing*

Grants and funding

Ulrich Glogowsky (UG) received financial support by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation): CRC TRR 190, Rationality and Competition. Emanuel Hansen (EH) received financial support by Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy – EXC2126/1 – 390838866. The funder provided support in the form of salaries for author SS, but did not have any additional role in the study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.