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Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study

OBJECTIVE: To investigate the association between participation in government subsidies for domestic travel (subsidise up to 50% of all travel expenses) introduced nationally in Japan on 22 July 2020 and the incidence of symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infections. DESIGN: Cross-sectional analysis of...

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Autores principales: Miyawaki, Atsushi, Tabuchi, Takahiro, Tomata, Yasutake, Tsugawa, Yusuke
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BMJ Publishing Group 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8050877/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33849861
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-049069
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author Miyawaki, Atsushi
Tabuchi, Takahiro
Tomata, Yasutake
Tsugawa, Yusuke
author_facet Miyawaki, Atsushi
Tabuchi, Takahiro
Tomata, Yasutake
Tsugawa, Yusuke
author_sort Miyawaki, Atsushi
collection PubMed
description OBJECTIVE: To investigate the association between participation in government subsidies for domestic travel (subsidise up to 50% of all travel expenses) introduced nationally in Japan on 22 July 2020 and the incidence of symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infections. DESIGN: Cross-sectional analysis of nationally representative survey data. SETTING: Internet survey conducted between 25 August and 30 September 2020 in Japan. Sampling weights were used to calculate national estimates. PARTICIPANTS: 25 482 survey respondents (50.3% (12 809) women; mean (SD) age, 48.8 (17.4) years). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Incidence rate of five symptoms indicative of the COVID-19 infection (high fever, sore throat, cough, headache, and smell and taste disorder) within the past month of the survey, after adjustment for characteristics of individuals and prefecture fixed effects (effectively comparing individuals living in the same prefecture). RESULTS: At the time of the survey, 3289 (12.9%) participated in the subsidy programme. After adjusting for potential confounders, we found that participants in the subsidy programme exhibited higher incidence of high fever (adjusted rate, 4.7% for participants vs 3.7% for non-participants; adjusted OR (aOR) 1.83; 95% CI 1.34 to 2.48; p<0.001), sore throat (19.8% vs 11.3%; aOR 2.09; 95% CI 1.37 to 3.19; p=0.002), cough (19.0% vs 11.3%; aOR 1.96; 95% CI 1.26 to 3.01; p=0.008), headache (29.2% vs 25.5%; aOR 1.24; 95% CI 1.08 to 1.44; p=0.006) and smell and taste disorder (2.6% vs 1.8%; aOR 1.98; 95% CI 1.15 to 3.40; p=0.01) compared with non-participants. These findings remained qualitatively unaffected by additional adjustment for the use of 17 preventative measures (eg, social distancing, wearing masks and handwashing) and fear against the COVID-19 infection. CONCLUSIONS: The participation of the government subsidy programme for domestic travel was associated with a higher probability of exhibiting symptoms indicative of the COVID-19 infection.
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spelling pubmed-80508772021-04-16 Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study Miyawaki, Atsushi Tabuchi, Takahiro Tomata, Yasutake Tsugawa, Yusuke BMJ Open Health Policy OBJECTIVE: To investigate the association between participation in government subsidies for domestic travel (subsidise up to 50% of all travel expenses) introduced nationally in Japan on 22 July 2020 and the incidence of symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infections. DESIGN: Cross-sectional analysis of nationally representative survey data. SETTING: Internet survey conducted between 25 August and 30 September 2020 in Japan. Sampling weights were used to calculate national estimates. PARTICIPANTS: 25 482 survey respondents (50.3% (12 809) women; mean (SD) age, 48.8 (17.4) years). MAIN OUTCOME MEASURES: Incidence rate of five symptoms indicative of the COVID-19 infection (high fever, sore throat, cough, headache, and smell and taste disorder) within the past month of the survey, after adjustment for characteristics of individuals and prefecture fixed effects (effectively comparing individuals living in the same prefecture). RESULTS: At the time of the survey, 3289 (12.9%) participated in the subsidy programme. After adjusting for potential confounders, we found that participants in the subsidy programme exhibited higher incidence of high fever (adjusted rate, 4.7% for participants vs 3.7% for non-participants; adjusted OR (aOR) 1.83; 95% CI 1.34 to 2.48; p<0.001), sore throat (19.8% vs 11.3%; aOR 2.09; 95% CI 1.37 to 3.19; p=0.002), cough (19.0% vs 11.3%; aOR 1.96; 95% CI 1.26 to 3.01; p=0.008), headache (29.2% vs 25.5%; aOR 1.24; 95% CI 1.08 to 1.44; p=0.006) and smell and taste disorder (2.6% vs 1.8%; aOR 1.98; 95% CI 1.15 to 3.40; p=0.01) compared with non-participants. These findings remained qualitatively unaffected by additional adjustment for the use of 17 preventative measures (eg, social distancing, wearing masks and handwashing) and fear against the COVID-19 infection. CONCLUSIONS: The participation of the government subsidy programme for domestic travel was associated with a higher probability of exhibiting symptoms indicative of the COVID-19 infection. BMJ Publishing Group 2021-04-13 /pmc/articles/PMC8050877/ /pubmed/33849861 http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-049069 Text en © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2021. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/This is an open access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited, appropriate credit is given, any changes made indicated, and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/) .
spellingShingle Health Policy
Miyawaki, Atsushi
Tabuchi, Takahiro
Tomata, Yasutake
Tsugawa, Yusuke
Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title_full Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title_fullStr Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title_full_unstemmed Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title_short Association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of COVID-19 infection in Japan: cross-sectional study
title_sort association between participation in the government subsidy programme for domestic travel and symptoms indicative of covid-19 infection in japan: cross-sectional study
topic Health Policy
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8050877/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33849861
http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2021-049069
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