SARS-CoV-2 suppression and early closure of bars and restaurants: a longitudinal natural experiment

  1. Reo Takaku
  2. Izumi Yokoyama
  3. Takahiro Tabuchi
  4. Masaki Oguni
  5. Takeo Fujiwara

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Abstract

Despite severe economic damage, full-service restaurants and bars have been closed in hopes of suppressing the spread of SARS-CoV-2 worldwide. This paper explores whether the early closure of restaurants and bars in February 2021 reduced symptoms of SARS-CoV-2 in Japan. Using a large-scale nationally representative longitudinal survey, we found that the early closure of restaurants and bars decreased the utilization rate among young persons (OR 0.688; CI95 0.515–0.918) and those who visited these places before the pandemic (OR 0.754; CI95 0.594–0.957). However, symptoms of SARS-CoV-2 did not decrease in these active and high-risk subpopulations. Among the more inactive and low-risk subpopulations, such as elderly persons, no discernible impacts are observed in both the utilization of restaurants and bars and the symptoms of SARS-CoV-2. These results suggest that the early closure of restaurants and bars without any other concurrent measures does not contribute to the suppression of SARS-CoV-2.

Article activity feed

  1. Version published to 10.1038/s41598-022-16428-4
  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.08.07.21261741v2 on medRxiv
  3. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.08.07.21261741: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Ethicsnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: We detected the following sentences addressing limitations in the study:
    Although this study is the first to investigate the independent effects of the early closure of restaurants and bars, there are several limitations. First, in our experimental setting, individuals in the prefectures with SE declarations could migrate to nearby prefectures to eat in restaurants and drink at bars. Thus, it is still possible that a nationwide closure, not local closures, would suppress the spread of SARS-CoV-2. However, in the preferred specification used in Figure 4, individuals living in an area within 10 km from the border to separate prefectures with and without SE declarations were excluded because they can easily cross the border; thus, our results are sufficiently robust to potential migration, and implications from our paper would be still applicable for the effects of a nationwide closure. The second limitation is related to the stable unit treatment value assumption (SUTVA) (Rubin, 2005; Halloran and Struchiner, 1995; VanderWeele, 2008). Because infectious diseases spread locally and rapidly, neighboring areas generally tend to have similar infection rates. Therefore, our research may underestimate the impact of the policy, even if the early closure of restaurants and bars suppresses SARS-CoV-2 to a large extend. However, if this threat is relevant, we should have found large negative effects in the models that include persons far from the border, like in Columns (1) and (2) in Table 2, because the spillover effects from the prefectures with SE declara...

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    Results from scite Reference Check: We found no unreliable references.

    About SciScore

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  4. Version published to 10.1101/2021.08.07.21261741v1 on medRxiv