The Ontario government announced today that many regions in the province will be allowed to move on to Stage 3 of reopening the economy as of Friday, July 17 at 12:01 a.m., but Toronto is one of the regions that will be required to remain in Stage 2 for now.

UCL-Lancet Lecture 2020: Global Health Preparedness in the Face of Emerging Epidemics

Independent SAGE

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The COVID-19 global pandemic has the potential to change family life and the household division of labour in significant ways. We surveyed 1,249 mothers and fathers in Canada in May 2020 to understand potential pandemic related changes in housework and childcare.

The Division of Labour Before & During the COVID-19 Pandemic in Canada

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This cross-national survey-based study examined in real time how the COVID-19 pandemic impacted food-centric matters in 1,732 Chinese and 1,547 U.S. households during the stay-at-home directives. Both cohorts reported increased efficiency in use of food, families spending more time cooking and eating together, and more prudent use of food with less waste. Food purchasing patterns shifted from frequent trips to the store to dramatic increases in online ordering. A small proportion (11% Chinese, 2% U.S. respondents) reported clinically significant weight gains of >4.5 kg. Household food insecurity worsened, with large increases in people worrying about or experiencing food shortage. Collective grocery-shopping experience by survey respondents indicated that the functional stability of food supply systems remained steady. All food types were somewhat available, except for noticeably higher prices widely reported by the Chinese cohort. This study offers insights into future food patterns and sheds light on long-term questions for additional research about how people make decisions and food behavioral changes at times of crisis and the consequences thereafter.

The COVID-19 Pandemic Impacting Household Food Dynamics: A Cross-National Comparison of China and the U.S.

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This study estimates cumulative infection rates from Covid-19 in Great Britain by geographical units and investigates spatial patterns in infection rates. We propose a model-based approach to calculate cumulative infection rates from data on observed and expected deaths from Covid-19. Our analysis of mortality data shows that between 5 and 6% of people in Great Britain were infected by Covid-19 by the last third of April 2020. It is unlikely that the infection rate was lower than 3% or higher than 12%. Secondly, England had higher infection rates than Scotland and Wales, although the differences between countries were not large. Thirdly, we observed a substantial variation in virus infection rates in Great Britain by geographical units. Estimated infection rates were highest in the capital city of London where more than 10% of the population might have been infected and also in other major urban regions, while the lowest were in small towns and rural areas. Finally, spatial regression analysis showed that the virus infection rates increased with the increasing population density of the area and the level of deprivation. The results suggest that people from lower socioeconomic groups in urban areas (including those with minority backgrounds) were most affected by the spread of coronavirus in March and April.

Infection Rates from Covid-19 in Great Britain by Geographical Units: A Model-based Estimation from Mortality Data

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We conducted an audit study with 262 community pharmacies from seven municipalities in the Northeast of Colombia. In the study, a simulated client called and described a list of symptoms experienced by her brother, and asked the pharmacist for a recommendation. In our "common" condition, the symptoms were headache, sore throat, and fever. In our COVID condition, we added anosmia (i.e., the loss of smell) as a fourth symptom, allowing better discrimination with respect to other diseases. We find that mentioning anosmia induced a more cautious behavior among pharmacists. The probability that pharmacists recommend to register the case in the dedicated emergency line increased from 19.7 to 32.2 percent, whereas the probability that pharmacists make a prescription decreased from 69.7 to 51.5 percent. The seven selected municipalities were drawn from dengue endemic and non-endemic areas. Although we hypothesized that past experience with symptoms from the common condition would make harder to provide adequate recommendations in endemic areas, we did not find differences in behavior supporting this hypothesis.

Mentioning anosmia improves how community pharmacies handle phone call requests during the COVID-19 pandemic: An audit study in Colombia

There’s no randomised trial evidence for social distancing, hand washing or even testing & contact tracing on #COVID19 so why is it being demanded for masks? I’m for it in all enclosed public spaces (if you can). We need to smile a tiny bit wider though so it shows from our eyes.

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) has advised people on Twitter that they can stop quarantining after travelling to England from certain foreign countries from 10 July. In one tweet, the FCO incorrectly suggested these rules apply to the whole UK. It has also been reported that transport minister Grant Shapps told BBC Breakfast on 3 July that, from 10 July onward, “you will be legal not to quarantine yourself.”  However, guidance published on the government’s official website by the Department for Transport (DfT) says that you must follow the rules that were in place on the date that you arrived in England. A spokesperson for the DfT confirmed that this is the correct guidance to follow. Since this story was published, the FCO has confirmed it has deleted one of the tweets and added corrections linking to the DfT guidance.

Government issues contradictory advice on travel quarantine

The clinical decision analysis (CDA) has used to overcome complexity and uncertainty in medical problems. The CDA is a tool allowing decision-makers to apply evidence-based medicine to make objective clinical decisions when faced with complex situations. The usefulness and limitation including six steps in conducting CDA were reviewed. The application of CDA results should be done under shared decision with patients’ value.

10.4178/epih/e2014025

The clinical decision analysis using decision tree

People need straightforward guidance or rules on coverings in England, say MPs

Boris Johnson urged to clarify message on wearing face masks in shops

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Exogenous threats pose a formidable coordination challenge to federations, as they compel governments at all levels to cooperate to prevent a collective risk. As the vertical fragmentation of powers complicates a coordinated response, we here argue that the central government becomes the focal point of the solution. In search of a more effective response against the threat, citizens coordinate their preferences around the centralization of authority boundaries in the federation. We test this argument using an on-line survey experiment in Spain, a country where the threat caused by COVID-19 has operated on top of non-negligible internal threats. The empirical analysis shows that exposure to vertical coordination failures prompt citizens to support a centralized redrawing of authority boundaries, though this effect is importantly conditioned by respondents’ ideology and territorial preferences. Our findings suggest that shocks may represent turning points for the stability of federations, as citizens demands for a redrawing of authority might be followed by beneficial or opportunistic adjustments of authority.

Popular Reactions To External Threats in Federations

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It is known that the new coronavirus (COVID-19) is disproportionately affecting the elderly, those with underlying medical conditions, and the poor. What is the effect of informing the public about these inequalities on people’s perceptions of threat and their sensitivity to the outbreak’s human toll? This study answers this question using a novel survey experiment and finds that emphasis on the unequal aspect of the pandemic, especially as it relates to the elderly and those with medical conditions, could be causing the public to become less concerned about the outbreak and its human toll. Discussion situates this finding in the literature on scientific communication and persuasion and explains why language that emphasizes the impact of the virus on all of us -- rather than singling out certain groups -- could be more effective in increasing caution among the general public and make them take the situation more seriously.

Disparate Impact Pandemic Framing Decreases Public Concern For Health Consequences

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Eyewitness media was boosted by ubiquitous smartphones and social media use. User-generated content by non-professionals, or netizens, has shed light on issues they deem important by capturing and sharing footage appealing to their inner digital network and mainstream media. However, the influence that digital testimonials exerts on activism and indexing has been restricted to those possessing some media training. This paper aims to fill this gap by providing a framework to guide vulnerable people experiencing harsh conditions to leverage the power of social media. The expectation is that such a guideline would help the most vulnerable draw the attention of other members of the community, authorities and mainstream media to the conditions they are in. The proposal of this framework is based on the theory of mediatized conflict and analysis of the hashtag #FallecidosCovid19Ec on Twitter. This hashtag helped organize scattered experiences, raise media attention and pressure officials to respond to urgent demands.

Powering Social Media Footage: Simple Guide for the Most Vulnerable to Make Emergency Visible

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic of 2020, the sudden shift to online offerings of higher education courses that would typically be taught face-to-face, has university administrators, educators, and students alike scrambling to prepare. The pedagogical movement towards active learning has always found a friend in the natural sciences, with laboratory and field components being standard to many programs. For instructors of ecology and evolution, the shift to online-only learning planned for autumn 2020 imposes limitations. As a first-time instructor teaching a course on evolutionary processes at the time of the COVID-19 outbreak, concurrent with being a student of a mentored teaching course and doctoral student in evolutionary ecology, I offer my perspective as a learner and an educator to guide decision-making by instructors. I emphasize the need to consider accessibility, equity, and compassion and the importance of building trust and a safe learning environment in the absence of face-to-face instruction. I describe some evolution-related resources and approaches to assessment I applied in the pivot-to-online context of March 2020, including COVID-19 teaching tools. Finally, I encourage scholars of evolution and ecology to bridge in contemporary scholarship on pedagogy to help teach the next generation of biologists.

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Towards equitable evolution & ecology learning online: a perspective from a first-time instructor teaching evolution during COVID-19

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Background. As the Covid-19 pandemic has grown internationally, there has been an increased need for volunteers. This study aimed to identify the predictors of volunteering including demographic backgrounds, socio-economic characteristics, personality and psychosocial factors. Methods. Data were analysed from 31,890 adults in the UK COVID-19 Social Study run by University College London; a longitudinal study focusing on the psychological and social experiences of adults living in the UK during the Covid-19 pandemic. Tetrachoric factor analysis was applied to identify latent categories of voluntary work. Multivariate logistic regression was used to identity predictors for volunteering and change in volunteering behaviours since before lockdown. Results. Three types of volunteering during the pandemic were identified: formal volunteering, social action volunteering, and neighbourhood volunteering. Regression analysis showed that the pattern of voluntary work was structured by demographic backgrounds, socio-economic factors, personality and psychological factors. Conclusion. The predictors of volunteering during the pandemic may be slightly different from other non-emergency period.

Predictors of engaging in voluntary work during the Covid-19 pandemic: analyses of data from 31,890 adults in the UK

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One in every two Indian households continues to rely on highly-polluting solid fuels to meet their cooking and other energy demands. Recent evidence demonstrates that people suffering from preconditions associated with air pollution and those with short-term exposures to air pollution are highly susceptible to the novel Coronavirus infection and associated morbidity and mortality. And as for many Indians, especially those with pre-existing health conditions and the elderly, home-based isolation and confinement practices are likely to continue to prevent the infection, exposure to household air pollution may render such population groups more susceptible to COVID-19. This warrants caution and demands immediate and specific actions; which are discussed. To protect the health and wellbeing of millions of Indians, during the COVID-19 crisis and beyond, addressing household air pollution should be prioritized and aligned with long term environmental health initiatives in the country.

Household air pollution and COVID-19 risk in India: A potential concern

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Social networks are a useful tool for informing the public. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it was through social networks that many state leaders have informed the public about their actions. I examine how many leaders used Twitter, in what way, and the impact they had on the public. In the context of Twitter, the impact on the public refers to the growth in followers as it signifies the increased interest of the public about information. In this article, I collected 50,872 tweets from 143 state leaders and created an original dataset containing information on the growth of followers. I used ordinary least square regression models. This led to the finding that 64.8% of UN member states had a leader that tweeted about COVID-19. Furthermore, a significant increase in the number of followers during the pandemic compared to months prior was noted. Since March, the pandemic has been a dominant topic on Twitter. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the highest percentage increase in gaining Twitter followers was experienced by politicians who frequently tweeted and those who had a lower ratio of the number of followers to internet users. The research implies that citizens are interested in being informed about emergencies through social networks, and government officials should use them.

The use of Twitter by state leaders and its impact on the public during the COVID-19 pandemic

10.31235/osf.io/x2b8w

The novel coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is impacting health globally, whereas older adults are highly susceptible and more likely to have adverse health outcomes. In Bangladesh, the elderly population has been increasing over the past few decades, who often live with poor socioeconomic conditions and inadequate access to healthcare services. These disparities are likely to increase amid COVID-19, which may result in high mortality and morbidity among Bangladeshi older adults. We recommend that multifaceted interventions should be adopted for strengthening social care and health systems approach to ensure wellbeing, promote preventive measures, and facilitate access to healthcare among older adults in Bangladesh. Such multipronged measures would require policy-level commitment and collaborative efforts of health and social care providers and institutions to protect health and wellbeing among this vulnerable population during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Geriatric health in Bangladesh during COVID-19: challenges and recommendations

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Indonesia has made several regulations to end the pandemic, including PSBB. This regulation is related to physical distancing in all sectors and activities, including religious activities. To strengthen this policy, MUI and other Islamic organizations have made fatwa and official statement about how worships, especially those which are done in groups should be conducted during this pandemic. But efforts made by government and other organizations are not enough to ensure society that these regulations will not affect their religiousity. This paper is a literature review aimed to describe and analyze religious-related cases of COVID-19 pandemic in Indonesia. It includes MUI, Muhammadiyah, and Nahdlatul Ulama responses (fatwa and official statement) to this issue and public responses as well. It also compared this case to vaccine hesitancy case, due to similarities between these two cases. Both of these cases are dealing with religious dogma as it affects the policies’ effectivity. Religious and community leaders are needed in this kind of cases in order to help government promote and educate people about health issues from religious perspectives. Moreover, some kinds of punishment made by government are needed to strengthen fatwas and rulings, as most of these religious opinions do not have legal enforcement.

A Timeline Response: How Does Islamic Organizations Respond to COVID-19 in Indonesia?

Using hypothes.is, we are annotating a growing knowledge base where you can find a wide range of items ranging from tweets, newspaper and blog articles, reports to preprints and peer-reviewed articles. This video shows you what you can do with this tool.

SciBeh’s Hypothes.is Tool

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Global fatalities related to COVID-19 are expected to be high in 2020-21. Developing and delivering a vaccine may be the most likely way to end the pandemic. If it were possible to shorten this development time by weeks or months, this may have a significant effect on reducing deaths. Phase 2 and Phase 3 trials could take less long to conduct if they used human challenge methods – that is, deliberately infecting participants with COVID-19 following inoculation. This article analyses arguments for and against such methods and provides suggested broad guidelines for regulators, researchers and ethics committees when considering these matters. It concludes that it may be possible to maintain current ethical standards yet still permit human challenge trials in a context where delay is critical. The implications are that regulators and researchers need to work together now to design robust but short trials and streamline ethics approvals processes so that they are in place when applications for trials are made.

Ethical Guidelines for Deliberately Infecting Volunteers with COVID-19

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We present a first approximation to the quantification of social representations about the COVID-19, using news comments. A web crawler was developed for constructing the dataset of reader’s comments. We detect relevant topics in the dataset using Latent Dirichlet Allocation, and analyze its evolution during time. Finally, we show a first prototype to the prediction of the majority topics, using FastText.

Capturing and analyzing social representations. A first application of Natural Language Processing techniques to reader’s comments in COVID-19 news. Argentina, 2020

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Around 1.8 billion Muslims worldwide celebrate in some extent the holy month of Ramadan during COVID-19 pandemic. Some increase their attendance worship sites and traditional dining in extended families, so infectious contact rates could increase. Moreover, fasting could increase the probability of acquiring SARS-CoV-2 infection. There are mitigation measures (e.g. Healthy Ramadan by WHO) applied to reduce the SARS-CoV-2 spread, however their real impact is still unknown. Multiple studies assessed observed effects of contact rates increase during holidays as Chinese New Year in January and Passover and Easter in April and their short-time effects on COVID-19 transmission dynamics. However, there are any quantitative attempts considering epidemiological consequences of the holy Ramadan (at least up to our knowledge and keywords search in various databases until the submission day). We analyze the fractions of Muslims and time series of COVID-19 daily incidence and cases numbers for 197 countries and territories. We found statistically significant positive link with proportion of Islam adherents with increase in normalized new cases of COVID-19 during 1-18 May 2020. Moreover, growth of incidences in May is statistically significantly greater than in a control (April).

Could Ramadan catalyze SARS-CoV-2 spread? Preliminary results

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Purpose: Over the past several months, the coronavirus has infected nearly 2 million Americans and killed more than 100,000. Governors have issued stay-at-home orders, and prosecutors have filed criminal charges against individuals for defying those orders. And yet, many Americans have still refused to keep their distance from their fellow citizens, even if they had symptoms of infection. This study explores the underlying causes for those who intend to defy these norms. Methods: Using national-level data from a March 2020 survey of 989 Americans, we explore intentions to defy social distancing norms by testing an interactionist theory of foundation-based moral behavior in combination with faith in President Trump. The analysis controls for a range of variables, including measures of low self-control and deterrence. Results: Low self-control is the strongest predictor of defiance intentions. Consistent with interactionist theory, defiance intentions are significantly higher for those holding a specific faith in Trump and those endorsing binding foundation. Furthermore, the interaction of these two variables is significant and in the predicted direction. The results hold for two different measures of faith in Trump. Conclusions: Even with a strong effect for low self-control, faith in President Trump is a strong predictor of refusal to social distance, and its effect is largest among individuals high in binding foundations.

Faith in Trump, Moral Foundations, and Social Distancing Defiance During the Coronavirus Pandemic

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The COVID-19 environment, where the internet is the literal lifeline and livelihood of humanity, has exposed the chasm between those equipped for technological existence and those shocked by abrupt isolation. For archives, many institutions are on an unforgiving precipice of irrelevancy. The focus of this paper is not to iterate the necessity of archival theory but to examine the position of appraisal within a technologically-driven, internet society. Of significance to this evaluation is that organization, retrieval, and use of information have evolved, and users are central players in curation cycles. Also, of importance are those archives shifting to, and innovating, decentralized digital models - and thriving. A historical overview of both fields shows that appraisal falters in technical maturation and in response to changes in how society generates, captures, and retrieves information. There exist alternate paradigms for archival roles and appraisal, however, including recognizing that users derive the interpretation of information and that transdisciplinary archivists are vital. There are also developments in digital archives where access is the bedrock of the arrangement and description and the entire appraisal process.

WAKING TO NORMAL: Examining Archival Appraisal in Data-driven Society

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The recent COVID-19 pandemic led to uncertainty and severe health and economic concerns, which may have impacted human-dog relationships. Our objectives were to investigate how people perceived and acted during the COVID-19 pandemic social isolation, in regards to dog adoption and abandonment; and to examine the bidirectional relationships between dog owners’ well-being to that of their dogs. Overall, according to our analysis, the stricter the social isolation became during the pandemic, the interest in dog adoption as well as adoption rate increased significantly, while abandonment did not change. Moreover, there was a clear association between individuals’ impaired quality of life and their perceptions of poorer life quality of their dogs as well as the development of new behavioral problems. These findings suggest potential benefits for human-dog relationship during the COVID-19 pandemic, in compliance with the One Welfare approach.

Human-dog relationships during COVID-19 pandemic; booming dog adoption during social isolation

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How can we explain the rise in diffuse political support during the Covid-19 pandemic? Recent research has argued that the lockdown measures generated political support. In contrast, I argue that the intensity of the pandemic rallied people around political institutions. Collective angst in the face of exponentially rising Covid-19 cases depresses the usual cognitive evaluations of institutions, and leads citizens to rally around existing intuitions as a lifebuoy. Using a representative Dutch household survey conducted over March 2020, I compare the lockdown effect to the dynamic of the pandemic. I find that the lockdown effect is driven by pre-existing time trends. Accounting for nonlinearities in time makes the lockdown effect disappear. In contrast, more flexible modelling techniques reveal a robust effect of Covid-19 infections on political trust. Moreover, I find that standard determinants of political trust – such as economic evaluations and social trust – lose explanatory power as the pandemic spreads. This speaks to an emotionally driven rally effect that pushes cognitive evaluations to the background.

Political trust during the Covid-19 pandemic: Rally around the flag or lockdown effects?

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Having first reached epidemic proportions in coastal metropolitan areas, COVID-19 has spread around the country. Reported case rates vary across counties from zero to 126 per thousand population (around a state prison in the rural county of Trousdale, Tennessee). Overall, rural counties are underrepresented relative to their share of the population, but a growing proportion of all daily cases and deaths have been reported in rural counties. This analysis uses daily reports for all counties to present the trends and distribution of COVID-19 cases and deaths in rural counties, from late March to May 21, 2020. I describe the relationship between population density and case rates in rural and non-rural counties. Then I focus on noteworthy outbreaks linked to prisons, meat and poultry plants, and nursing homes, many of which are linked to high concentrations of Hispanic, American Indian, and Black populations. The growing epidemic in rural counties is apparently driven by outbreaks concentrated in these institutional settings, which are conducive to transmission. The impact of the epidemic in rural areas may be heightened due to their weaker health infrastructure and more vulnerable populations, especially due to age, socioeconomic status, and health conditions. As a result, the epidemic may contribute to the ongoing decline of health, economic, and social conditions in rural areas.

The COVID-19 epidemic in rural U.S. counties

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Governments around the world restricted movement of people, using social distancing and lockdowns, to help stem the global coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. We examine crime effects for one UK police force area in comparison to 5-year averages. There is variation in the onset of change by crime type, some declining from the WHO ‘global pandemic’ announcement of 11 March, others later. By one week after the 23 March lockdown, all recorded crime had declined 41%, with variation: shoplifting (-62%), theft (-52%), domestic abuse (-45%), theft from vehicle (-43%), assault (-36%), burglary dwelling (-25%) and burglary non-dwelling (-25%). We use Google Covid-19 Consumer Mobility Reports to calculate the mobility elasticity of crime for four crime types, finding shoplifting and other theft inelastic but responsive to reduced retail sector mobility (MEC = 0.84, 0.71 respectively), burglary dwelling elastic to increases in residential area mobility (-1), with assault inelastic but responsive to reduced workplace mobility (0.56). We theorise that crime rate changes were primarily caused by those in mobility, suggesting a mobility theory of crime change in the pandemic. We identify implications for crime theory, policy and future research.

Crime and coronavirus: Social distancing, lockdown and the mobility elasticity of crime

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All of the policies adopted or proposed so far to slow the spread of the novel coronavirus require immediate and extensive behavioral change. However, even when the benefit of the behavior change is supported by solid science, actually changing behavior is difficult. Doing so effectively requires an appreciation for how people learn behaviors, and translate information into action. Insights from the evolutionary human sciences can improve the behavioral change toolkit for researchers and policy makers. Specifically, effective behavior change policy should be based on an understanding of humans as a cultural and cooperative species. Socially transmitted information and culturally-informed motivations shape behavior change. The structure of social networks and how group identities map onto those networks in turn influence transmission dynamics. Information can spread from person to person, similar to the way diseases spread. Just as with disease, the epidemiology of information is subject to structural and behavioral influences on transmissibility. We show why and how 1) the pandemic poses several adaptive challenges with important tradeoffs, 2) people use social information to learn how to deal with these, and 3) people adopt social norms in a group-based context.

Dynamics of Behavior Change in the COVID World

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At present, the epidemic situation of COVID-19 is raging rampantly in the whole world, affecting the hearts of billions of people. In less than half a year, COVID-19 swept the world, seriously threatening the safety of all mankind. At the beginning, the epidemic was most serious in China. Under the strong command of the highest level of the Chinese government, the whole Chinese people United as one, and achieved initial results in the struggle against covid-19 with scientific prevention and control. Summarizing China's experience and lessons in combating the epidemic is undoubtedly very beneficial to the people of the world in jointly combating the impact of the COVID-19 epidemic. The most important experience is: strong organizational leadership, enhanced cooperation with the WHO, the establishment of a national anti-epidemic headquarters, responsible for the command and control of human, financial and material resources throughout the country, and local officials at all levels in the front line of the epidemic. Heart to heart with the people, breathe together and share a common destiny. Prevention is the first, prevention and treatment are combined. The treatment emphasizes the combination of Chinese and Western medicine. The “Four Anti and Two Balances” advocated by Academician Li Lanjuan’s team, and the “Three Drugs and Three Formulas” recommended by Chinese medicine experts of the National and Health Commission, played a key role in improving the success rate of treatment. Establish fever clinics and establish square cabin hospital to eliminate infections in hospitals, emphasizing the protection of medical staff and avoiding cross-infection. Control the source of infection, try to achieve "four early", early detection, early isolation, early diagnosis and early treatment. "Four concentration", focus on patients, experts, resources and treatment. Take all measures to cut off the spread. Take all measures to protect susceptible people. Wearing masks, washing hands frequently, hot bathing, individual serving, home office, going out to maintain a social distance of more than one meter, eating nutritious foods rich in protein and vitamins, strengthening physical exercise and improving physical fitness are all effective ways to prevent COVID-19.

China Experience in Controlling COVID-19

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The higher education departments and bodies in India have been continuously advising on the intense use of technology for educating as the need of the hour when institutions are indefinitely shut off for COVID-19. But, I would differ on a point that in a digitally divided country like India such impulses may escalate the divide further. The regular discussions on the materiality of smartphone possession as the new mantra to bridge the digital divide in India failed to take note of its spatial and infrastructural dimensions in times of crisis. The letter views spatial distance from the core urban areas as the factor that determines the mobile network availability. In times of pandemic when the services are officially declared as deploring the divide gets intensified for students. Firstly, the failed attempts of a student to join online classes deprive her/his of parity vis-à-vis students having relatively better access to the internet. Secondly, coupled with the multiple apprehensions, this deprivation would add to her/his collapsing mental health.

COVID-19, online teaching, and deepening digital divide in India

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This report aims to provide basic facts about gender inequality in income, time use, and wellbeing before and during the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK. We compare employment, income, time use, and well-being figures reported before and during the lockdown period (late March to April 2020) of the same group of individuals by analyzing longitudinal data from the 2020 UK Household Longitudinal Survey (UKHLS) COVID study and the full UKHLS data. Earlier studies on the topic are based on cross-sectional data with different survey designs and sample selections. - Women undertake the major share of housework and childcare and form 80% of the health and social care workers who are more exposed to the virus, among people aged between 20 to 49. - There was a 30% reduction in paid work time for both women and men, and the percentage was 45% among non-key workers. Women and men experienced a similar amount (3-4 hours) of an increase in weekly housework hours. We also note a comparable reduction in monthly labour income for women and men. - Women, especially mothers experienced a more dramatic decline in well-being amid the COVID pandemic. - Single mothers fare the worst in the labour market, are the least likely to own a house, have a car in the household, and have the highest risk of depression, which makes them particularly vulnerable in the current circumstances. Single parents experience the largest 7% increase in the non-working rates during the lockdown period. - Childcare support is critical when the usual support networks, such as grandparents, friends, and neighbours, can no longer help with childcare, especially for mothers.

Gender inequalities: Changes in income, time use and well-being before and during the UK COVID-19 lockdown

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We use party-identifying language – like “Liberal Media” and “MAGA”– to identify Republican users on the investor social platform StockTwits. Using a difference-in-difference design, we find that the beliefs of partisan Republicans about equities remain relatively unfazed during the COVID-19 pandemic, while other users become considerably more pessimistic. In cross-sectional tests, we find Republicans become relatively more optimistic about stocks that suffered the most from COVID-19, but more pessimistic about Chinese stocks. Finally, stocks with the greatest partisan disagreement on StockTwits have significantly more trading in the broader market, which explains 20% of the increase in stock turnover during the pandemic.

Does Partisanship Shape Investor Beliefs? Evidence from the COVID-19 Pandemic

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The unprecedented growth of the novel coronavirus (SARS-CoV-2) as a severe acute respiratory syndrome escalated to the 2019 coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic. It has created an unanticipated global public health crisis. The virus is spreading rapidly in India which poses serious threat to 135 crore population. Population density poses some unforeseen challenges to control the COVID-19 contagion. In times of crisis, data is crucial to understand the spatial relationship between density and the infection. The article study the district wise transmissions of the novel coronavirus in five south Indian states until 6th June 2020 and its relationship with the respective population density. The five states are purposefully selected for better healthcare infrastructure vis-à-vis other states in India. We observed that corona virus spread depends on the spatial distribution of population density in three states especially in Tamil Nadu, Karnataka and Telangana. The results indicate that the long-term impacts of the COVID-19 crisis are likely to differ with demographic density. Policy initiatives aimed at reducing the health consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic should understand how vulnerabilities cluster together across districts.

Nexus between population density and COVID-19 pandemic in the south Indian states: A geo-statistical approach

Nexus between population density and COVID-19 pandemic in the south Indian states: A geo-statistical approach

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Objective Educational provision changed during the lockdown period of the COVID-19 outbreak in the UK (20th March to 31st May 2020) with schooling moving online. The Prime Minister announced a timetable for partial reopening of school on 10th May. With the return to partial schooling imminent, the views of year 10 and year 12 students were surveyed. Design Cross-sectional web-based survey disseminated via closed social media fora. Setting A structured questionnaire hosted on Google Forms™ and disseminated via two Facebook™ fora in the week prior to the original stated date of return to partial schooling for year 10 and year 12 students (20th to 27th May 2020). Participants United Kingdom school students in year 10 (age 14 to 15 years old) and year 12 (age 16 to 17 years old). Main outcome measures Views of year 10 and year 12 students on returning to schools with a focus on their opinions on government guidance, impact on their future, and how remote learning has impacted on their education. Results 1534 students (yr10 n= 1007 66%, yr12 n=527 34%) completed the questionnaire. Students were equally divided in opinion with 781 (51%) preferring to return to partial schooling with limited educational contact and 753 (49%) preferring to remain isolated at home with remote schooling, when an unsure option was removed. A majority (73%, n=1111) of students feel unsafe or unsure that Government guidelines will be enough to protect them from COVID-19 in a school environment. 79% (n=1205) of students felt that COVID-19 has impacted on their future. 15% (n=231) of students said they have had no additional support or guidance from their school during remote learning. Conclusions Year 10 and 12 school students were divided equally in their preferences about returning to partial school. Exploration of their uncertainty by thematic analysis revealed the source to be anxieties around safety. Students feel they are being put at risk and because guidelines will be impossible to enforce in a school environment. Some students recognised a need to return to education despite this perceived risk. An inequity in the standard of education was identified with 15% (n=231) of students reporting that they did not receive any support during the 87 days of lock down. School students expressed desire that their concerns be heard by the Government. Better consideration needs to be taken of the concerns of these year groups in the future.

Year 10 and 12 school students' opinions on returning to partial schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic: an action research prospective survey

10.31235/osf.io/k3z6m

COVID-19 pandemic is affecting negatively the tourism and hospitality industry. As people must avoid physical interaction, service robots can be a useful tool to ensure a high level of physical social distance during the epidemic. This paper discusses whether the application of service robots to provide physical distance in the tourism and hospitality context is going to be beneficial or there will be side effects as well. The paper posits that service robots create a technological shield between tourists and employees that increases the physical and emotional distance between them.

Service robots as a tool for physical distancing in tourism

10.31235/osf.io/ub3zd

Do political and social features of states help explain the evolving distribution of reported Covid-19 deaths? We identify national-level political and social characteristics that past research suggests may help explain variation in a society's ability to respond to adverse shocks. We highlight four sets of arguments---focusing on (1) state capacity, (2) political institutions, (3) political priorities, and (4) social structures---and report on their evolving association with cumulative Covid-19 deaths. After accounting for a simple set of Lasso-chosen controls, we find that measures of government effectiveness, interpersonal and institutional trust, bureaucratic corruption and ethnic fragmentation are currently associated in theory-consistent directions. We do not, however, find associations between deaths and many other political and social variables that have received attention in public discussions, such as populist governments or women-led governments. Currently, the results suggest that state capacity is more important for explaining Covid-19 mortality than government accountability to citizens, with potential implications for how the disease progresses in high-income versus low-income countries. These patterns may change over time with the evolution of the pandemic, however. A dashboard with daily updates, extensions, and code is provided at https://wzb-ipi.github.io/corona/.

Political and Social Correlates of Covid-19 Mortality

10.31235/osf.io/yu5br

To limit the social, economic and psychological damage caused by strict social distancing interventions, many low and middle-income countries (LMICs) are seeking to ease restrictions. However, it is unknown what a ‘safe reopening’ entails in LMICs given suboptimal diagnostic and surveillance capabilities. Here we discuss three community-based public health measures (sustained mitigation, zonal lockdown and dynamic rolling lockdowns) which seek to adequately balance the public health and economic priorities. Each of these options have limitations and prerequisites that may be context-specific and should be considered before implementation, including implementation and maintenance costs, social and economic costs, context-specific epidemic growth and the existing health resources.

Lifting the lockdown: what are the options for low and middle-income countries?

10.31235/osf.io/p25nh

What will be political legacy of the Coronavirus pandemic? We find that epidemic exposure in an individual's impressionable years (ages 18 to 25) has a persistent negative effect on confidence in political institutions and leaders. We find similar negative effects on confidence in public health systems, suggesting that the loss of confidence in political leadership and institutions is associated with healthcare related policies at the time of the epidemic. In line with this argument, our results are mostly driven by individuals who experienced epidemics under weak governments with less capacity to act against the epidemic, disappointing their citizens. We provide evidence of this mechanism by showing that weak governments took longer to introduce policy interventions in response to the COVID-19 outbreak. These results imply that the Coronavirus may leave behind a long-lasting political scar on the current young generation ("Generation Z").

The Political Scar of Epidemics

10.31235/osf.io/z4ndc

This paper investigates the “cultural” transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak.Using West Germany data we observe that in predominantly Catholic regions with stronger social and family ties, the spread and the resulting deaths per capita were much higher compared to non-Catholic ones at the NUTS-3 level. This finding could help explain the rapid spread and high death toll of the virus in some European countries compared to others in the initial stage. Looking at differences within a specific country in a well identified setting eliminates biases due to different social structures, healthcare systems, specific policies and measures, and testing procedures for the virus that can confound estimates and hinder comparability across countries. Further,we use individual level data as well as Apple mobility data to investigate potential mechanisms. The results highlight the cultural dimension of the spread and could suggest the implementation of targeted mitigation measures in light of disease outbreaks

Spreading the disease: The role of culture