 The psychological gains from COVID-19 vaccinationManuel Bagues and Velichka Dimitrova Journal of Public Economics, 2025, vol. 242, issue C Abstract: We estimate the impact of COVID-19 vaccination on psychological well-being using information from a large-scale panel survey representative of the UK population. Exploiting exogenous variation in the timing of vaccinations, we find that vaccination increases psychological well-being (GHQ-12) by 0.12 standard deviations, compensating for one-half of the deterioration in mental health caused by the pandemic. This improvement persists for at least two months, and is linked to higher engagement in social activities and a decrease in the self-reported likelihood of contracting COVID-19. The main beneficiaries are individuals who became mentally distressed during the pandemic, supporting their prioritization in vaccination roll-outs. Conversely, individuals who harbored concerns about potential vaccine side effects show no improvement in psychological well-being upon vaccination, underscoring the importance of public confidence in vaccine safety and efficacy. Accounting for the improvement in psychological well-being increases the benefits of vaccination by around 50%. Keywords: Psychological well-being; COVID-19 vaccination; Instrumental variables and regression discontinuity design (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:242:y:2025:i:c:s0047272725000027 DOI: 10.1016/j.jpubeco.2025.105304 Access Statistics for this article Journal of Public Economics is currently edited by R. Boadway and J. Poterba More articles in Journal of Public Economics from Elsevier |
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