Abstract
The objective of this study was to assess the relationship between public protests and county-level, novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) hospitalization rates across California. Publicly available data were included in the analysis from 55 of 58 California state counties (29 March–14 October 2020). Mixed-effects negative binomial regression models were used to examine the relationship between daily county-level COVID-19 hospitalizations and two main exposure variables: any vs. no protests and 1 or >1 protest vs. no protests on a given county-day. COVID-19 hospitalizations were used as a proxy for viral transmission since such rates are less sensitive to temporal changes in testing access/availability. Models included covariates for daily county mobility, county-level characteristics, and time trends. Models also included a county-population offset and a two-week lag for the association between exposure and outcome. No significant associations were observed between protest exposures and COVID-19 hospitalization rates among the 55 counties. We did not find evidence to suggest that public protests were associated with COVID-19 hospitalization within California counties. These findings support the notion that protesting during a pandemic may be safe, ostensibly, so long as evidence-based precautionary measures are taken.
Highlights
The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the Severe AcuteRespiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has ravaged communities across the United States (U.S.)
Between 29th March and 14th October 2020, any protest or number of protests were not associated with increased rate in COVID-19 hospitalizations across 55 California counties, trends were in the opposite direction
Our study did not find evidence of increased COVID-19 hospitalization rates after protests occurred in California counties
Summary
The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, caused by the Severe AcuteRespiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), has ravaged communities across the United States (U.S.). Between 23 January 2020 and 26 August 2021, the U.S recorded more than 38 million cumulative cases and 630,000 related deaths [1].Since the virus can be transmitted by pre-symptomatic and asymptomatic carriers [2], strategies to mitigate the spread of the virus will continue to be central to the public health response alongside vaccine roll-out. Such mitigation strategies to reduce SARS-CoV-2 transmission have included stay-at-home orders, mask-wearing, and social-distancing guidelines, as well as contact tracing and self-quarantining [3,4,5,6].
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