Multiple Concurrent Causal Relationships and Multiple Governance Pathways for Non-Pharmaceutical Intervention Policies in Pandemics: A Fuzzy Set Qualitative Comparative Analysis Based on 102 Countries and Regions

Yaming Zhang, Jiaqi Zhang (), Yaya Hamadou Koura, Changyuan Feng, Yanyuan Su, Wenjie Song and Linghao Kong
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Yaming Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Jiaqi Zhang: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Yaya Hamadou Koura: School of Foreign Languages, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Changyuan Feng: Business School, University of Granada, Campus Universitario de Cartuja, 18071 Granada, Spain
Yanyuan Su: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Wenjie Song: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China
Linghao Kong: School of Economics and Management, Yanshan University, Qinhuangdao 066004, China

IJERPH, 2023, vol. 20, issue 2, 1-16

Abstract: The global outbreak of COVID-19 has been wreaking havoc on all aspects of human societies. In addition to pharmaceutical interventions, non-pharmaceutical intervention policies have been proven to be crucial in slowing down the spread of the virus and reducing the impact of the outbreak on economic development, daily life, and social stability. However, no studies have focused on which non-pharmaceutical intervention policies are more effective; this is the focus of our study. We used data samples from 102 countries and regions around the world and selected seven categories of related policies, including work and school suspensions, assembly restrictions, movement restrictions, home isolation, international population movement restrictions, income subsidies, and testing and screening as the condition variables. A susceptible-exposed-infected-quarantined-recovered (SEIQR) model considering non-pharmaceutical intervention policies and latency with infectiousness was constructed to calculate the epidemic transmission rate as the outcome variable, and a fuzzy set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) method was applied to explore the multiple concurrent causal relationships and multiple governance paths of non-pharmaceutical intervention policies for epidemics from the configuration perspective. We found a total of four non-pharmaceutical intervention policy pathways. Among them, L1 was highly suppressive, L2 was moderately suppressive, and L3 was externally suppressive. The results also showed that individual non-pharmaceutical intervention policy could not effectively suppress the spread of the pandemic. Moreover, three specific non-pharmaceutical intervention policies, including work stoppage and school closure, testing and screening, and economic subsidies, had a universal effect in the policies grouping for effective control of the pandemic transmission.

Keywords: viral transmission; non-pharmaceutical intervention; grounded theory; COVID-19; fsQCA; SEIQR (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
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