Scenario analysis of non-pharmaceutical interventions on global COVID-19 transmissions

TL;DR

This study uses a dynamic panel SIR model to evaluate how different non-pharmaceutical interventions impact COVID-19 spread across nine countries, suggesting alternative strategies to lockdowns and highlighting country-specific NPI needs.

Contribution

Introduces a novel DP-SIR model to analyze the effects of various NPIs on COVID-19 transmission using global panel data, providing policy insights.

Findings

School closures, mask wearing, and quarantine can control COVID-19 without lockdowns.

Some countries may need additional NPIs to effectively control the outbreak.

Others might consider easing certain NPIs to reduce economic impact.

Abstract

This paper introduces a dynamic panel SIR (DP-SIR) model to investigate the impact of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) on the COVID-19 transmission dynamics with panel data from 9 countries across the globe. By constructing scenarios with different combinations of NPIs, our empirical findings suggest that countries may avoid the lockdown policy with imposing school closure, mask wearing and centralized quarantine to reach similar outcomes on controlling the COVID-19 infection. Our results also suggest that, as of April 4th, 2020, certain countries such as the U.S. and Singapore may require additional measures of NPIs in order to control disease transmissions more effectively, while other countries may cautiously consider to gradually lift some NPIs to mitigate the costs to the overall economy.