Study Evaluates Effectiveness Of Indoor Vaccine Mandates In Us Cities During Covid-19

Research published successful Contemporary Economic Policy reveals that contempt wide take of indoor vaccine mandates successful awesome US cities during nan COVID-19 pandemic, location is nary accordant grounds that these policies importantly accrued vaccination rates aliases reduced COVID-19–related outcomes. The findings opposition pinch those from different countries, arsenic nationalist mandates overseas boosted vaccine uptake.

For nan study, investigators estimated really mandates that restricted entree to indoor venues for unvaccinated individuals impacted first-dose uptake, COVID-19 cases, and deaths crossed 9 US cities done what's called nan synthetic difference-in-differences method. The method estimates nan effect of a city's indoor vaccine instruction by constructing a "synthetic" power for nan metropolis utilizing a weighted mean of untreated metropolitan areas that intimately matched pre-mandate trends successful nan result of interest.

The scientists recovered nary accordant shape of statistically important impacts of nan mandates connected first-dose vaccine uptake, COVID-19 cases, aliases deaths crossed nan 9 cities. The results situation assumptions astir nan effectiveness of section nationalist wellness interventions and propose that section mandates whitethorn beryllium little impactful erstwhile vaccine sum is already high, erstwhile group tin sidestep restrictions by walking to adjacent cities, and erstwhile nan governmental situation is highly polarized. The findings could beryllium useful for processing early nationalist wellness strategies and policies.

We wanted to return a careful, data-driven look astatine what these policies really accomplished successful nan US context. By nan clip astir cities introduced indoor vaccine mandates, vaccination rates were already high, and galore unvaccinated individuals were profoundly hesitant aliases resistant, leaving constricted room for further gains. Our findings don't propose that mandates can't work-only that their effectiveness depends connected timing, context, and really easy group tin sidestep section restrictions."

Elijah Neilson, PhD, corresponding author of Southern Utah University