Working Paper: NBER ID: w29563
Authors: Alexander Karaivanov; Dongwoo Kim; Shih En Lu; Hitoshi Shigeoka
Abstract: We evaluate the impact of government mandated proof of vaccination requirements for access to public venues and non-essential businesses on COVID-19 vaccine uptake. We find that the announcement of a mandate is associated with a rapid and significant surge in new vaccinations (more than 60\\% increase in weekly first doses) using the variation in the timing of these measures across Canadian provinces in a difference-in-differences approach. Time-series analysis for each province and for France, Italy and Germany corroborates this finding, and we estimate cumulative gains of up to 5 percentage points in provincial vaccination rates and 790,000 or more first doses for Canada as a whole as of October 31, 2021 (5 to 13 weeks after the provincial mandate announcements). We also find large vaccination gains in France (3 to 5 mln first doses), Italy (around 6 mln) and Germany (around 3.5 mln) 11 to 16 weeks after the proof of vaccination mandate announcements.
Keywords: COVID-19; Vaccination Mandates; Vaccine Uptake
JEL Codes: C23; I12; I18
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Announcement of a mandate (E60) | Surge in new vaccinations (I19) |
| Surge in new vaccinations (I19) | Additional first doses administered in Canada (N22) |
| Announcement of a mandate (E60) | Increase in provincial vaccination rates (H75) |
| Announcement of a mandate (E60) | Surge in vaccinations in France, Italy, and Germany (O52) |
| Announcement of a mandate (E60) | Increase in first doses in Ontario and Alberta (O51) |