Public health implications of opening National Football League stadiums during the COVID-19 pandemic

Bernardo García Bulle, Dennis Shen, Devavrat Shah and Anette E. Hosoi
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Bernardo García Bulle: a Institute for Data, Systems and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139;
Dennis Shen: b Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing, Melvin Calvin Laboratory, University of California, Berkeley, CA 94720;
Devavrat Shah: a Institute for Data, Systems and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139;; c Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139;
Anette E. Hosoi: a Institute for Data, Systems and Society, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139;; d Department of Mechanical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2022, vol. 119, issue 14, e2114226119

Abstract: Using data from 2020, we measure the public health impact of allowing fans into sports stadiums during the COVID-19 pandemic; these results may inform future policy decisions regarding large outdoor gatherings during public health crises. Second, we demonstrate the utility of robust synthetic control in this context. Synthetic control and other statistical approaches may be used to exploit the underlying low-dimensional structure of the COVID-19 data and serve as useful instruments in analyzing the impact of mitigation strategies adopted by different communities. As with all statistical methods, reliable outcomes depend on proper implementation strategies and well-established robustness tests; in the absence of these safeguards, these statistical methods are likely to produce specious or misleading conclusions.

Keywords: COVID-19; synthetic control; sports stadiums; pandemic policies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022
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