The effect of state-level social distancing policy stringency on mobility in the states of Brazil

Lorena G Barberia,Maria Leticia Claro De Faria Oliveira,Isabel Seelaender Costa Rosa,Natália De Paula Moreira,Luiz G R Cantarelli

doi:10.1590/0034-761220200549

Lorena G Barberia, Maria Leticia Claro De Faria Oliveira + Show 3 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1590/0034-761220200549

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Abstract

Abstract In Brazil, sub-national governments have played a particularly important role as the key actors implementing non-pharmaceutical interventions to halt the spread of COVID-19. Building on the methodology proposed by the Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker (OxCGRT), we coded the stringency levels of state-level school, commerce, services, industry, public gathering, and private event closure policies and describe these actions’ duration at the state-level in Brazil from early February to mid-May 2020. Our results suggest significant heterogeneity across Brazil and across weeks in social distancing policy stringency during this period. We then apply dynamic times-series cross-sectional methods to evaluate the effect of anti-contagion policies on the population’s mobility using cell phone location data. We find that anti-contagion policies had a significant effect on producing higher adherence to remaining at home even though social distancing policies were relatively moderate as compared to other countries. Our results also suggest that social distancing policies have a greater impact when a more complete and coherent set of policies were introduced and sustained by state governments.

Highlights

Governments across the world have responded rapidly and with an unprecedented wide-range of measures to address the spread of a coronavirus, which was first detected in China and reported to the WHO in December 2019.1 The virus was declared a pandemic by the World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11, 2020 (World Health Organisation, 2020) and was detected in most countries by early March
The coronavirus pandemic struck many of the states of Brazil, and the proportion of infections was still low in some states by early May, other states experienced a rapid increase in infections and the collapse of their hospital system due to the sudden surge in patients (Orellana, Cunha, Marrero, Horta & Leite, 2020)
After introducing the (COVID-19 Government Response Tracker for the Brazilian Federation [CGRT-BRFED]) (Barberia et al, 2020a), the remaining sections of this study evaluate whether variations in the social distancing policies adopted by the 26 states of the Brazilian federation and the federal district since the onset of the pandemic led to different rates of mobility by citizens residing in these states

Summary

Introduction

As one of the world’s most populous democracies encompassing roughly half of South America, the COVID pandemic struck Brazil, a country with over 200 million inhabitants, as it continued to face political and economic duress stemming from the aftermath of a protracted regression that began in 2014 (Barbosa, 2017) and political polarization stemming from the impeachment of president Dilma Rouseff in 2016 and the election of Jair Bolsonaro in 2018 (Abrucio, Grin, Franzese, Segatto & Couto, 2020) In this context, the risks posed by the coronavirus were especially high for millions of people who live in poverty or have only recently emerged from it and due to the limited infrastructure that exists for those requiring hospital care (Rache et al, 2020). The coronavirus pandemic struck many of the states of Brazil, and the proportion of infections was still low in some states by early May, other states experienced a rapid increase in infections and the collapse of their hospital system due to the sudden surge in patients (Orellana, Cunha, Marrero, Horta & Leite, 2020).

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