What difference did the COVID vaccine and masking make in the US?


The US economy appears to be emerging from the recent recession (pace the Fed interest rate decisions). There’s a general consensus that that recession was largely caused by the COVID-19 pandemic and consequent supply chain disruptions. What lessons might be learned on how to maximally blunt the impact of future pandemics while minimizing negative economic consequences?

Here’s a cross-sectional analysis including all 50 US states plus the District of Columbia to evaluate the impact of various interventions on excess COVID-19 deaths over a 2-year analysis period.

“Mask requirements and vaccine mandates were negatively associated with excess deaths, prohibitions on vaccine or mask mandates were positively associated with death rates, and activity limitations were mostly not associated with death rates. If all states had imposed restrictions similar to those used in the 10 most restrictive states, excess deaths would have been an estimated 10% to 21% lower than the 1.18 million that actually occurred during the 2-year analysis period; conversely, the estimates suggest counterfactual increases of 13% to 17% if all states had restrictions similar to those in the 10 least-restrictive states. The estimated strong vs weak state restriction difference was 271 000 to 447 000 deaths, with behavior changes associated with 49% to 79% of the overall disparity.”

While the findings, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association, do not support the claims that COVID-19 restrictions were *ineffective*, some were less effective than others. For example, school closings, likely provided minimal benefit while imposing substantial cost.

I certainly don’t consider this study dispositive, but it brings the receipts to back its conclusions. 

 

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama-health-forum/fullarticle/2821581

 

 

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