Bartscher AK, Seitz S, Siegloch S, Slotwinski M, Wehrhöfer N. Social capital and the spread of covid-19: Insights from european countries.
J Health Econ 2021;
80:102531. [PMID:
34607120 PMCID:
PMC8520571 DOI:
10.1016/j.jhealeco.2021.102531]
[Citation(s) in RCA: 19] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.3] [Reference Citation Analysis] [What about the content of this article? (0)] [Affiliation(s)] [Abstract] [Key Words] [MESH Headings] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 01/21/2021] [Revised: 09/02/2021] [Accepted: 09/03/2021] [Indexed: 05/03/2023]
Abstract
We investigate the effect of social capital on health outcomes during the Covid-19 pandemic in independent analyses for Austria, Germany, Great Britain, Italy, the Netherlands, Sweden and Switzerland. Exploiting detailed geographical variation within countries, we show that a one-standard-deviation increase in social capital leads to between 14% and 34% fewer Covid-19 cases per capita accumulated from mid-March until end of June 2020, as well as between 6% and 35% fewer excess deaths per capita. Our results highlight the positive health returns of strengthening social capital.
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