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Current Research

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Economists from around the world are using real time data collection to better understand the impact the Covid-19 crisis is having on families, workers, firms and society, and how policies can help the recovery out of the crisis. Find out more about how these research teams are carrying out their projects, and what their findings are below.

Understanding the impacts of Covid-19 on the provision of NHS health care and patient outcomes

We will provide a detailed description of the extent to which non-Covid-19 NHS activity has been affected by Covid-19, who is most affected, and how patient outcomes have changed. Covid-19 has led to enormous changes in the provision of NHS care. All...
Lead investigator: Carol Propper
Countries

Identifying and mitigating the impact of Covid-19 on inequalities experienced by people from BAME backgrounds working in health and social care

Prior to Covid-19, the NHS England Workforce Race Equalities Standard (WRES) found that BAME staff experience considerably greater levels of workplace harassment and discrimination, lower pay, less control and poorer working conditions than non-BAME ...
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Stephani Hatch
Countries

Resilience of the UK seafood system to the Covid-19 disruption (RiseUp)

The UK seafood industry is under unprecedented pressure to deliver on national food security during Covid-19/SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, while trying to adapt to remain socio-economically viable. However, no data exists on the systemic impacts to the UK sea...
Primary Topic: Business, big & small
Secondary Topic: Recession & recovery
Lead investigator: Sofia C. Franco
Countries

Will Covid-19 change what the public expect of government?

Previous research on pandemics, infectious disease, and recession suggests that Covid-19 could have a significant impact on the public’s public policy preferences - and thus the environment in which policymakers will have to address the pandemic’...
Secondary Topic: Recession & recovery
Lead investigator: John Curtice
Countries

Identifying and mitigating the individual and dyadic impact of Covid-19 and life under physical distancing on people with dementia and carers (INCLUDE)

People with dementia say that personal contact is key to their well-being, while many family members providing unpaid care are isolated and feel lonely. People with dementia and the family members who care for them are especially vulnerable to the im...
Lead investigator: Linda Clare
Countries

Gendering the UK's social policy response to the Covid-19 crisis

The Covid-19 outbreak and resultant economic crisis has led to governments around the world, including the UK, taking extraordinary action to support citizens facing unprecedented shocks to their livelihoods. Bodies such as the International Labour O...
Primary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Secondary Topic: Families & households
Lead investigator: Rose Cook
Countries

Centre for longitudinal studies

A nationwide survey of the participants of five national longitudinal cohort studies, to examine the impact of the pandemic, help understand how people at different life stages are affected, and how prior life experiences shape resilience or vulnerab...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Health, physical & mental
Lead investigator: Alissa Goodman
Countries

Trust and trustworthiness in national and global governance

An online national survey in the UK, US and Italy which includes questions 9 on Covid-19 and political trust. Focus groups exploring political trust in towns and cities relating to Covid-19.
Lead investigator: Will Jennings
Countries

Responding to the Covid-19 domestic abuse crisis: developing a rapid police evidence base

The proposed project provides a near real-time evidence base to inform the police approach to the apparent surge in domestic violence and abuse (DA) triggered by the Covid-19 lockdown in the UK. Police case file data from seven diverse police forces ...
Primary Topic: Crime & policing
Secondary Topic: Families & households
Lead investigator: Katrin Hohl
Countries

Entrepreneurial resiliency, innovation, and change during the Covid-19 crisis

The project will address this gap while producing immediately useful information for entrepreneurs and policymakers about how the impacts of the crisis change over time and how firms can build strategic resiliency in the face of an unprecedented cris...
Secondary Topic: Business, big & small
Lead investigator: Benjamin Spigel
Countries

DETERMIND-C19: impact of Covid-19 on people newly diagnosed with dementia and their family carers, a mixed method study nested in DETERMIND

People with dementia are at high risk of adverse outcomes from Covid-19 and may also be adversely affected by the steps taken by society to control the spread of the infection. They have difficulty remembering and understanding restrictions and preca...
Lead investigator: Sube Banerjee
Countries

Assessing financial vulnerability and risk in the UK's charities during and beyond the Covid-19 crisis

This research will provide an analysis of the variegated impacts on charities of the very severe financial constraints they will experience due to the immediate and longer-term economic effects of the Covid-19 crisis. Building on our extensive prior ...
Primary Topic: Charities & volunteering
Lead investigator: John Mohan
Countries

Covid-19: Families, children aged 0-4 and pregnant women: vulnerabilities, resources and recovery in Tower Hamlets

Adverse impacts of the current Covid-19 pandemic will disproportionately fall on individuals and families at the lower end of the income distribution. The highly diverse population profile offers an opportunity to identify how families deploy their i...
Primary Topic: Families & households
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Claire Cameron
Countries

Necessary discussions: advance care planning for nursing homes in a Covid-19 outbreak

It is likely that nursing homes in the UK will become clusters in their communities for the worst clinical manifestations of Covid-19 (1). Since all nursing home residents are at substantial risk, nursing home care staff need to know what residents w...
Lead investigator: Kevin Brazil
Countries

The geography of post Covid-19 shutdown recovery risk in UK economic activity. implications for recovery inequality and targeted stimulus

The Covid-19 shutdown is not affecting all parts of the UK equally. Economic activity in local consumer service industries (LCSI), such as retail outlets, restaurants, hairdressers, or gardeners has all but stopped; other industries are less affected...
Primary Topic: Recession & recovery
Secondary Topic: Inequality & poverty
Lead investigator: Jesse Matheson
Countries

Covid-19: The local as a site of food security resilience in the times of pandemic: opportunities, challenges and ways forward.

The Covid-19 pandemic has significantly impacted on the UK’s food systems, and disruptions are likely to continue. There is emerging evidence that the local food sector (local food producers and their supply chains) can significantly contribute to ...
Primary Topic: Trade & supply chains
Secondary Topic: Business, big & small
Lead investigator: Anna Krzywoszynska
Countries

The effects of social distancing policies on children’s language development, sleep and executive functions.

The environments children grow up in heavily influence key elements of cognitive development such as language and executive functions, which in turn associate with later educational and occupational attainment as well as health and wellbeing (1–8)....
Lead investigator: Nayeli Gonzalez-Gomez
Countries

A duty of care and a duty to teach: educational priorities in response to the Covid-19 lockdown

This research explores the challenges the Covid-19 crisis sets primary schools, using surveys and telephone interviews to analyse how teachers weigh a duty of care (for their pupils’ well-being and welfare) and a duty to teach (given their responsi...
Lead investigator: Gemma Moss
Countries

Lockdown and voting behaviour: a natural experiment on postponed elections during the Covid-19 pandemic.

The goal of this paper is to study the impact of the lockdown policy on voting behaviour, during the Covid-19 pandemic. We focus on France, where a differential lockdown was implemented across departments, based on the local diffusion of the disease....
Secondary Topic: Nations, regions & cities
Lead investigator: Tommaso Giommoni
Countries

Economic narratives and policy ppinions: a survey experiment on Covid-19 stories

Narratives may impact people’s beliefs on relevant policy issues, and political context may mediate these effects. Indeed, some specific contexts may be more easily swayed by certain stories that provide explanations for current social and economic...
Lead investigator: Armenak Antinyan
Countries