WORKING PAPER

Stringency in policy responses to Covid-19 pandemic

and social distancing behavior in selected countries

A H M Belayeth Hussain*

April 20, 2020

Abstract

This paper investigates the relationships of government’s stringencies in policy measures to respond
to the Covid-19 pandemic and “social distancing” behavior across countries. Amid coronavirus
(nCovid-19) pandemic, the trending advice for “social distancing” has become one of the most popular
yet contentious recommendations in many countries. Studies have shown that cities and states that
had early and broad isolation and preventive measures had a 30% to 50% lower outbreak and fatality
rates than other cities during the Spanish Flu nearly a century ago. This paper finds that the “social
distancing” performance of communities significantly depends on the government’s policy stringency
level. The countries with stricter government responses and measures have experienced higher
compliance with “social distancing” advice, and hence experienced slower coronavirus growth rates
than the countries with softer stringencies. Among the coronavirus hardest-hit countries, a 1.00 unit
increase in government’s stringency to respond to the Covid-19 decreases 0.69 unit in people’s
workplace mobility. For the same countries, 1.00 unit rise in government’s stringency contributes to
0.31 unit more “stay at home”. Among the studied 32 countries, a 1.00 unit increase in government
stringency measure reduces 0.57 unit of workplace mobility among the working people. The countries
with 1.00 unit more stringency level contribute to 0.25 unit more “stay-at-home.” This paper uses two
sources of data: OxCGRT Stringency Index and Google’s community mobility data. The paper
concludes that governments across the countries with more stringent policies to respond to Covid-19
pandemic could give rise to “social distancing” performance, which further contributes to curve the
death tolls.
Key words: Covid-19; Coronavirus; Social distancing; Governments; Stringency index

____________________________
*Senior Lecturer
Centre for Research on Women and Gender (KANITA)
Universiti Sains Malaysia (USM)
belayeth@usm.my

Electronic copy available at: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3586319

1. Introduction

Amid coronavirus (nCovid-19) pandemic, the trending advice for "social distancing” has become one

of the most popular yet contentious recommendations in many countries. Studies have shown that

cities and states that had early and broad isolation and preventive measures had a 30% to 50% lower

outbreak and fatality rates than other cities during the Spanish Flu nearly a century ago. Studies

investigated the hypothesis that the Spanish Flu multiple waves were caused by people avoiding

potentially infectious contacts, a behavior termed “social distancing” interventions, which could play

a significant role in mitigating the public health impact of future influenza pandemics (Caley et al.,

2007). During this current pandemic situation around the world, some studies also have found a

positive impact of “social distancing” to flatten the curve of coronavirus outbreak. People’s restricted

mobility to workplaces and other commonly traveled places help reduce the coronavirus rise

(Yilmazkuday, 2020). This can have a better outcome when government measures across the countries

become more stringent as the outbreak gets spiked (Hale et.al., 2020). To restrict people’s mobility

during the pandemic, government’s policy choices play a decisive role that helps curve the rise of the

death toll. Governments’ decisions on social distancing, movement restrictions, and lockdowns have

negative associations with people’s mobility to retail and recreation centers, groceries and pharmacies,

parks, transit stations, and workplaces (Hussain, 2020). The same decisions have a positive association

with people’s stay-at-home behavior. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends people to

maintain at least one-meter distance between persons (WHO, 2020). However, this advice seems

purely a "physical distancing" between persons (among whom there might be a potential carrier of

coronavirus). On the other hand, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) explains

"social distancing" which they also call "physical distancing" as a way of people’s mobility to keep them

distant from others (CDC, 2020). This definition includes at least two meters distance from other

people; to avoid gathering in groups; and staying out of crowded places and mass gatherings (CDC,

2020). Some researchers argue that the term "social distancing" should be replaced with “spatial

distancing” along with “social closeness”. They recommend that public health advice should approach

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the threat of Covid-19 by promoting "spatial distance" together with "social closeness" (Abel and

McQueen, 2020).

As governments around the world have responded to the Covid-19 pandemic, the latest information

about their policies is essential to offer further avenues. Oxford Covid-19 Government Response

Tracker (OxCGRT) has developed a new robust index that demonstrates levels of policy measures

that the governments across countries have taken to tackle the spread of pandemic (Hale et al., 2020).

The authors of OxCGRT have collected various policy responses to Covid-19 pandemic based on 11

indicators, namely, school closure, workplace closure, cancellation of public events, closure of public

transports, closure of public campaigns, imposing movement restrictions, imposing international travel

controls, introducing fiscal and monetary measures, emergency investment in health care, investment

in vaccines, testing policy, and, contact tracing, etc.

Google (2020) has introduced a report on people’s mobility as a response to social distancing advice

during the Covid-19 pandemic. This report is made possible to track people’s movement using location

services in the countries where this service is available. Google identifies six major locations where

people are used to traveling and moving in their everyday needs. The six defined areas are: retail and

recreation centers that include restaurants cafes, shopping centers, theme parks, museums, libraries,

and movie theatres; groceries and pharmacies that include the locations of grocery markets, food

warehouses, farmers markets, food shops, drug stores, and pharmacies; various parks that include

national parks, public beaches, plazas, and public gardens; transit stations are the locations including

subways, bus and train stations; workplaces where people use to travel during workdays; and,

residential places where people stay.

This paper finds that the “social distancing” performance of communities significantly depends on the

government’s policy stringency level. To define “social distancing,” this study considers three areas of

people’s mobility during the pandemic. The “social distancing” indicators of people’s movement are

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— “stay-at-home,” “mobility towards workplaces,” and “mobility towards public parks.” The study

finds that the countries with stricter government policy responses and measures have experienced

higher compliance with “social distancing” advice, and hence experienced a slower coronavirus growth

rate than the countries with softer stringencies. Among the coronavirus hardest-hit countries, a 1.00

unit increase in government’s stringency to respond to the Covid-19 decreases 0.69 unit in people’s

workplace mobility. For the same countries, 1.00 unit increase in government’s stringency contributes

to 0.31 unit more “stay at home.” Among the studied 32 countries, a 1.00 unit increase in government

stringency measure reduces 0.57 unit of workplace mobility among the working people. For these

countries, with 1.00 unit more stringency level contributes to 0.25 unit more “stay-at-home.” This

paper utilizes two sources of data: OxCGRT Stringency Index and Google’s community mobility data.

2. Data

This paper appropriates two sources of data: OxCGRT Stringency Index (Hale et al., 2020) and

Google’s data (2020) on community mobility (Chan et al., 2020). During the pandemic, the

governments across countries have declared and implemented some initiatives that include social

distancing, movement restrictions, public health measures, socio-economic measures, and lockdown

declarations. ACAPS (2020) has compiled all the measures implemented by governments worldwide.

As a relatively robust way of indexing, the OxCGRT has developed a stringency index for each

countries depending on its policy responses to the Covid-19 pandemic. Using 11 indicators on

governments’ responses to Covid-19, the OxCGRT developed a “0 to 100 point Index” for country-

level stringency. On the other, Google mobility data reports how people’s community mobility at

different places has changed compared to a baseline. As explained by Google, the benchmark is a

median value of the five weeks, January 3, 2020, to February 6, 2020. Provided that data from both

sources are available from February 16, 2020, to March 29, 2020, this paper chooses 32 countries from

all geographic regions. The selected countries are ­— Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil, Canada,

Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Netherlands, New

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Zealand, Philippines, Norway, Singapore, Portugal, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Spain,

Sweden, Switzerland, Taiwan, Thailand, Turkey, United Kingdom, United States of America.

3. Results

Stringent measures and social distancing

Figure 1 demonstrates different governments’ stringencies to ensure social distancing across countries

over time (February 16, 2020, to March 29, 2020). Australia, Ireland, Japan, Singapore, South Korea,

Sweden, Taiwan, Thailand, United Kingdom, and the United States had been experiencing a softer

level of stringencies than the other studies countries mentioned in the Figure. On the other, the

countries with Stringency Index over 90 and above are Austria, Denmark, Finland, France, India,

Israel, Italy, Malaysia, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Philippines, Saudi Arabia, South Africa,

Spain, and Turkey. Among the coronavirus hardest-hit countries, the United States and the United

Kingdom had the least level of stringencies from their governments. As of April 26, 2020, the Unites

States share around one-fourth of total death tolls in the world, while among the European nations,

United Kingdom has the third highest deaths per million populations of the country. Asian countries

are among the top, where governments have stricter advice for their citizens. India, Israel, Malaysia,

the Philippines, Saudi Arabia, and Turkey are among them. However, some Asian nations, for example,

Japan, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan, had softer advice for their citizens amid the Covid-19

pandemic. Singapore, which had a minimal number of confirmed cases up until late March 2020 has

now the highest among the ASEAN countries.

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 Figure 1: Stringencies across countries

Figure 2 brings together two different charts demonstrating the state of stringencies and resultant

social distancing performances across the countries. In the first chart, scatters show the linear increase

of stringency levels in the countries. The same chart also shows a sharp decline in people’s workplace

presence and appearance in public places. Conversely, people’s propensity to stay at home had

increased compared to their baseline time (median score of previous months). The chart indicates that

from mid-February until mid-March 2020, the growth rate of confirmed coronavirus cases has risen

that follow a slow decline after mid-March. As time advanced, the consequences of relative rise in the

stringency levels of governments’ policies and pieces of advice fell into the reductions in citizen’s

community mobility towards workplaces and public parks that indicate the sharp rise in social

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distancing performances. As the chart shows, after mod-March until the end of the month, another

indicator of social distancing, people’s stay-at-home has increased than the baseline period. From all

five lines in the chart, the paper infers that the stricter the government rules, the more the social

distancing performance can achieve by a country.

Figure 2: Governments' stringencies and social distancing

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In Figure 2, the second chart shows two comparative regression lines on top of a scatter plot of

stringency levels across countries. Using the data wrangling and tidying procedures in R programming,

I made another group of data-frame that has observations from the coronavirus hardest-hit countries.

They are United States, United Kingdom, Italy, France, Germany, and Spain. In the chart, the “blue”

linear regression line indicates overall (32 countries) predicted increase in people’s “stay-at-home”

behavior.

Figure 3: Governments' stringencies and social distancing

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as a result of stricter public health advices from the government. The “red” regression line indicates

the predicted contingency for the top hit six countries. The chart confirms that the coronavirus

hardest-hit countries would have better “stay-at-home” performance (as an indicator of social

distancing) than the overall result of all 32 countries. For them, a 1 unit increase in stringencies of

government measures results in a 0.31 unit increase in “stay-at-home (Table 2). This result is statistically

significant, with a p-value of 0.000 and R-squared of0.77 (Table 2). On the same social performance

indicator, among 32 countries, with 1 unit increase in stringencies of government measures results in

a 0.25 unit reduction in “stay-at-home.” This result is also statistically significant, with a p-value of

0.000 and R-squared of 0.66.

Likewise, Figure 3 brings together two charts demonstrating the level of stringencies and consequent

social distancing performances across the countries. In the first chart, the “blue” linear regression line

indicates a sharp reduction in people’s mobility towards workplaces. The findings infer that this

reduction is a result of stricter public health advice from the government. However, when it comes to

comparing the top six affected countries, it is seen that the hardest-hit countries have even sharper

decline than the overall fall in workplace presence. The “red” regression line indicates the predicted

dependency of people’s restricted mobility towards workplaces on the stringency levels of the

governments' measures to curve the Covid-19 pandemic in the hardest hit six countries. The lines in

this chart confirm that the coronavirus hardest-hit countries would have a sharper decline in workplace

presence (as an indicator of social distancing) than the overall result of all 32 countries. For 32

countries, with 1 unit increase of stringencies in government measures reduces -0.57 (p-value = 0.000;

R-squared = 0.58) unit of workplace presence during the pandemic (Table 1). For the hardest-hit six

countries, a 1 unit increase in stringencies in government measures leads a -0.69 unit decline (p-value

= 0.000; R-squared = 0.75) in community mobility towards workplaces (Table 2).

The second chart demonstrates that the studied countries have experience of controlled community

mobility towards public parks. This result also has the same confirmation as it is showed in the first

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chart — the hardest-hit counties have responded to stricter stringencies of public health advice more

than all 32 countries. However, the trend is similar in both groups of countries.

Stringencies and social distancing in hardest hit countries

Figure 4 has four charts that demonstrate the effects of stringencies in government decisions on the

Covid-19 case growth rate and social distancing performances in selected six countries. All the four

charts present linear regression lines that indicate the dependencies of social distancing performances

and coronavirus case growth on the stringency levels. The first chart shows that a linear increase in

confirm case growth rate as stringency levels increase. However, this trend is slow and steady. Among

the hardest-hit countries, this rate grows with a higher rate than the average growth rate in all 32

countries included in this study. Italy, Spain, and France had the strictest levels of government

measures for public health advice. On the other, the United States and the United Kingdom had softer

levels of stringencies with a higher rate of fatalities than the overall average. The second chart shows

that the nationals of Italy, Spain, and France had the highest number of people who had stayed at

home during the observed days in February and March 2020. With the stringency level of around 77,

20% more people had stayed at home in the United States, and in Germany. In contrast, with the

stringency levels of nearly 100, approximately 38% more people had stayed at home than the previous

base month. In the third chart, as the stringency levels grew up, people’s mobilities towards workplaces

were restricted in six selected countries.

Like the other two charts I discussed earlier, Italy, Spain, and France performed best with the highest

levels of stringencies. With approximately the same stringency level as it is with the United States and

Germany, the United Kingdom showed much more reductions in workplace presence. However, the

United States had the least performance in decline in workplace mobility than their counterparts. In

the fourth chart, the trend remains the same for selected countries with an exception for the United

States. While in the other five countries, with higher levels of stringencies, people’s community

mobilities to public parks were much lower, the United States had the experience of higher flows to

parks even than the predicted line.

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 Figure 4: Stringencies and social distancing in the hardest hit countries

Table 1: Government stringency impacts on social distancing (32 countries)

Model Estimate Str. Err. R-sq. p-value

Workplaces ~ Stringency.Index -0.69155 0.02476 0.7530 0.000
Stay.at.Home ~ Stringency.Index 0.30668 0.01037 0.7736 0.000
Parks ~ Stringency.Index -0.89580 0.04240 0.6355 0.000

Table 2: Government stringency impacts on social distancing (6 hardest hit countries)

Model Estimate Std. Err. R-sq. p-value

Workplaces ~ Stringency.Index -0.56727 0.01315 0.5752 0.000
Stay.at.Home ~ Stringency.Index 0.24996 0.00482 0.6623 0.000
Parks ~ Stringency.Index -0.44415 0.02203 0.2283 0.000

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Discussions and conclusions:

Governments’ policy measures on social distancing comprise of limiting public gatherings, school

closure, public service closure, and changes in prison-related policies. Social and economic measures

(including governance) have decisions related to the declaration of the state of emergency, economic

measures, activation of emergency administrative structures, and limiting export-import products.

Governments’ initiatives related to public health introduce, implement and strengthen quarantine

policies, awareness campaigns, general recommendations, public health systems, infection testing

policies, psychological assistance, and medical social work. Globally, the governments also have

introduced movement restriction policies that include surveillance and monitoring, border closures,

visa restrictions, domestic travel restrictions, additional health documents upon arrivals, curfews, etc.

Finally, with some exceptions, countries have declared partial and full lockdowns in state and territorial

levels.

The governments across the countries have declared and implemented some social, economic, public

health, and governance-related decisions. The principal reason was to keep people away from the social

contacts of others that help flatten out the rise of the covid-19 outbreak. From the data analyses, this

paper explores that the people of most of the countries have responded to the governments’ initiatives

to slow down the rise. As a result, people stay at home, reduce their mobility to workplaces and public

parks. Social distancing actions and policies in response to the Covid-19 pandemic have substantial

economic benefits. In essence, three to four months of moderate distancing would save 1.7 million

lives, and the mortality benefit of moderate social distancing is about $ 8 trillion or around $60,000 per

household in the United States (Greenstone et al., 2020). As the “social distancing” policies are of great

importance among the political leaders, public health experts, and policymakers, some studies also urge

that political leaders must introduce social-distancing policies that do not bias against any population

group in the country (Joseph et al., 2020). This fear extends further in other studies; for example, Stein

(2020), in response to another study, Stein (2020) urges for a rationally layered social distancing.

Because the Covid-19 pandemic disproportionately affects different groups of people, including age

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and health conditions of the victims. Therefore, a layered social distancing idea would be a decisive

determinant and predictor of successful pandemic preparedness, and to support social distancing for

vulnerable groups and to protect other individuals from the susceptible group (Stein, 2020). Therefore,

the effectiveness and societal impact of social distancing will largely depend on the credibility of public

health authorities, political leaders, and institutions (Joseph et al., 2020).

From the analyses, this paper finds that the coronavirus hardest-hit countries have better “social

distancing” performance, although they did not have as many stringencies as other nations did.

However, some trends might be interesting for further studies — Nordic countries and some East

Asian countries had fewer “social distancing” than the West and South European countries. This trend

might have been in practice due to the hardest hit coronavirus disease situations in the West and South

European nations. However, some Asian countries had experienced the highest level of stringencies

even they did not face severe spreads during the studied periods. These may be the case of the nature

and types of governments in the respective countries. With a variety of interventions and conditions,

it is confirmed that the less strict the social distancing, the more time it will take for life to return to

normal, and the more lives will be at risk (Cano et al., 2020). Therefore, whatever the government

types, in this study on the stringencies and social distancing across countries, it is concluded that

governments across the countries with more stringencies to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic could

give rise to “social distancing” performance which further contributes to curve the death tolls.

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