Public Compliance With Social Distancing Measures and SARS-CoV-2 Spread : A Quantitative Analysis of 5 States.
Public Health Rep
; 136(4): 475-482, 2021.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1206101
ABSTRACT
OBJECTIVE:
We quantified the association between public compliance with social distancing measures and the spread of SARS-CoV-2 during the first wave of the epidemic (March-May 2020) in 5 states that accounted for half of the total number of COVID-19 cases in the United States.METHODS:
We used data on mobility and number of COVID-19 cases to longitudinally estimate associations between public compliance, as measured by human mobility, and the daily reproduction number and daily growth rate during the first wave of the COVID-19 epidemic in California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York.RESULTS:
The 5 states mandated social distancing directives during March 19-24, 2020, and public compliance with mandates started to decrease in mid-April 2020. As of May 31, 2020, the daily reproduction number decreased from 2.41-5.21 to 0.72-1.19, and the daily growth rate decreased from 0.22-0.77 to -0.04 to 0.05 in the 5 states. The level of public compliance, as measured by the social distancing index (SDI) and daily encounter-density change, was high at the early stage of implementation but decreased in the 5 states. The SDI was negatively associated with the daily reproduction number (regression coefficients range, -0.04 to -0.01) and the daily growth rate (from -0.009 to -0.01). The daily encounter-density change was positively associated with the daily reproduction number (regression coefficients range, 0.24 to 1.02) and the daily growth rate (from 0.05 to 0.26).CONCLUSIONS:
Social distancing is an effective strategy to reduce the incidence of COVID-19 and illustrates the role of public compliance with social distancing measures to achieve public health benefits.Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Physical Distancing
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Observational study
Limits:
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
North America
Language:
English
Journal:
Public Health Rep
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
00333549211011254
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