COVID-19 testing and big data: effects on the spread of the virus

Abstract

The study explores "Tamponi e big-data, what effects on the diffusion of Covid-19?", reconstructing the problem and the main evidence developed in the text. According to recent data from the World Health Organization (February 7, 2011), more than 104 million cases were confirmed and the deaths exceeded 2.6 million. In order to control the spread of pandemic, most countries have announced and implemented strict measures to restrict individuals’ movements and imposed the obligation of social space. Between March 8 and June 23, in fact the swabs every thousand inhabitants made in the Veneto region have passed from 3 to 80, while in the Lombardy region, in the same temporal arc, they are increased only from 2 to 58. The points represent the estimated coefficients, taking as a baseline the day before the announcement of the policy, while the dots represent the confidence intervals (95%). We can conclude that what emerges from this first empirical analysis is that the spread of the buffers combined with an effective analysis of the test results seems to have been a useful tool that has significantly contributed to the fight against the spread of the pandemic.

Keywords

Public health; COVID-19 pandemic; Local authorities; Lombardy; Italy; assessment of policies

JEL codes

I18; H51; H12