30,000 Cases & 700 Deaths -Scientific study on the effects of Trump Rallies on the Viruses' spread.

[kpete]

We investigate the effects of large group meetings on the spread of COVID-19 by studying the impact of eighteen Trump campaign rallies.

The Effects of Large Group Meetings on the Spread of
COVID-19: The Case of Trump Rallies
B. Douglas Bernheim Nina Buchmann Zach Freitas-Groff
Sebasti´an Otero*
October 30, 2020

To capture the effects of subsequent contagion within the pertinent communities, our analysis encompasses up to ten post-rally weeks for each event. Our method is based on a collection of regression models, one for each event, that
capture the relationships between post-event outcomes and pre-event characteristics, including demographics and the trajectory of COVID-19 cases, in similar counties. We explore a total of 24 procedures for identifying sets of matched counties. For the vast majority of these variants, our estimate of the average treatment effect across the eighteen events implies that they increased subsequent confirmed cases of COVID-19 by more than 250 per 100,000 residents. Extrapolating this figure to the entire sample, we conclude that these eighteen rallies ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 incremental confirmed cases of COVID-19. Applying countyspecific post-event death rates, we conclude that the rallies likely led to more than 700 deaths (not necessarily among attendees).

MORE:
https://sebotero.github.io/papers/COVIDrallies_10_30_2000.pdf