IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/plo/pgph00/0000112.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Prioritizing public health? Factors affecting the issuance of stay-at-home orders in response to COVID-19 in Africa

Author

Listed:
  • Gregg R Murray
  • Joshua Rutland

Abstract

COVID-19 has sickened and killed millions of people globally. Conventional non-pharmaceutical interventions, particularly stay-at-home orders (SAHOs), though effective for limiting the spread of disease have significantly disrupted social and economic systems. The effects also have been dramatic in Africa, where many states are already vulnerable due to their developmental status. This study is designed to test hypotheses derived from the public health policymaking literature regarding the roles played by medical and political factors as well as social, economic, and external factors in African countries’ issuance of SAHOs in response to the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic. Using event history analysis, this study analyzed these five common factors related to public health policy to determine their impact on African states’ varying decisions regarding the issuance of SAHOs. The results of this analysis suggest that medical factors significantly influenced decisions as did factors external to the states, while the role of political factors was limited. Social and economic factors played no discernible role. Overall, this study suggests how African leaders prioritized competing factors in the early stages of a public health crisis.

Suggested Citation

  • Gregg R Murray & Joshua Rutland, 2022. "Prioritizing public health? Factors affecting the issuance of stay-at-home orders in response to COVID-19 in Africa," PLOS Global Public Health, Public Library of Science, vol. 2(1), pages 1-30, January.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pgph00:0000112
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pgph.0000112
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/article?id=10.1371/journal.pgph.0000112
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pgph.0000112&type=printable
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1371/journal.pgph.0000112?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bruce Bueno de Mesquita & Alastair Smith & Randolph M. Siverson & James D. Morrow, 2005. "The Logic of Political Survival," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262524406, December.
    2. Ariel I. Ahram & J. Paul Goode, 2016. "Researching Authoritarianism in the Discipline of Democracy," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 97(4), pages 834-849, December.
    3. Müller-Crepon, Carl, 2020. "Continuity or Change? (In)direct Rule in British and French Colonial Africa," International Organization, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(4), pages 707-741, October.
    4. Berry, Frances Stokes & Berry, William D., 1990. "State Lottery Adoptions as Policy Innovations: An Event History Analysis," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 84(2), pages 395-415, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Amy Y. Li, 2017. "Covet Thy Neighbor or “Reverse Policy Diffusion”? State Adoption of Performance Funding 2.0," Research in Higher Education, Springer;Association for Institutional Research, vol. 58(7), pages 746-771, November.
    2. Lars P. Feld & Horst Zimmermann & Thomas Döring, 2003. "Föderalismus, Dezentralität und Wirtschaftswachstum," Vierteljahrshefte zur Wirtschaftsforschung / Quarterly Journal of Economic Research, DIW Berlin, German Institute for Economic Research, vol. 72(3), pages 361-377.
    3. Mahsa Jahandideh, 2020. "Resource‐driven victory," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 22(4), pages 877-898, August.
    4. Folke, Olle & Rickne, Johanna & Smith, Daniel M., 2018. "Gender and Dynastic Political Recruitment," Working Paper Series 1233, Research Institute of Industrial Economics.
    5. Kaplan, Lennart, 2025. "Resolving the puzzle of "reversed favoritism" in African agriculture," Kiel Working Papers 2300, Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel).
    6. Chune Young Chung & Jung Hoon Byun & Jason Young, 2019. "Corporate Political Ties and Firm Value: Comparative Analysis in the Korean Market," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(2), pages 1-25, January.
    7. Fonseca, Camila & Jiang, Haiyue & Zeerak, Raihana & Zhao, Jerry Zhirong, 2024. "Explaining the adoption of electric vehicle fees across the United States," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 139-149.
    8. William D. Berry & Jacqueline H. R. DeMeritt & Justin Esarey, 2010. "Testing for Interaction in Binary Logit and Probit Models: Is a Product Term Essential?," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 54(1), pages 248-266, January.
    9. Adam, Antonis & Tsavou, Evi, 2020. "One strike and you’re out! Dictators’ fate in the aftermath of terrorism," MPRA Paper 103772, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 2020.
    10. Tang, Lianzhou & Xu, Wenli, 2025. "Patronage and pollution," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    11. Raouf Boucekkine & Rodolphe Desbordes & Paolo Melindi-Ghidi, 2023. "Elite-led revolutions," AMSE Working Papers 2319, Aix-Marseille School of Economics, France.
    12. Felix Strebel & Thomas Widmer, 2012. "Visibility and facticity in policy diffusion: going beyond the prevailing binarity," Policy Sciences, Springer;Society of Policy Sciences, vol. 45(4), pages 385-398, December.
    13. Bhalla, Manaswini & Chatterjee, Kalyan & Dutta, Souvik, 2021. "Social reform as a path to political leadership: A dynamic model," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 191(C), pages 982-1010.
    14. Xiaohan Li & Yang Lv & Md Nazirul Islam Sarker & Xun Zeng, 2022. "Assessment of Critical Diffusion Factors of Public–Private Partnership and Social Policy: Evidence from Mainland Prefecture-Level Cities in China," Land, MDPI, vol. 11(3), pages 1-15, February.
    15. Adlai Newson & Francesco Trebbi, 2018. "Authoritarian elites," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(4), pages 1088-1117, November.
    16. Cormier, Benjamin, 2023. "Chinese or western finance? Transparency, official credit flows, and the international political economy of development," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 115294, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    17. Auriol, Emmanuelle & Platteau, Jean-Philippe, 2017. "Religious co-option in autocracy: A theory inspired by history," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 127(C), pages 395-412.
    18. Andreas Bernecker & Pierre C. Boyer & Christina Gathmann, 2021. "The Role of Electoral Incentives for Policy Innovation: Evidence from the US Welfare Reform," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 13(2), pages 26-57, May.
    19. Lei, Zhenhuan & Nugent, Jeffrey B., 2018. "Coordinating China's economic growth strategy via its government-controlled association for private firms," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(4), pages 1273-1293.
    20. Pierre André & Paul Maarek & Fatoumata Tapo, 2018. "Ethnic Favoritism: Winner Takes All or Power Sharing? Evidence from school constructions in Benin," THEMA Working Papers 2018-03, THEMA (THéorie Economique, Modélisation et Applications), Université de Cergy-Pontoise.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:plo:pgph00:0000112. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: globalpubhealth (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://journals.plos.org/globalpublichealth .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.