Faculty research on COVID and protests

Public health professor Dr. Linh Bui publishes study on link between the two

By California State University, Bakersfield

October 20^th, 2021

Dr. Linh Bui joined California State University, Bakersfield earlier this fall as part of the school’s new public health program, but between starting a new job on campus and helping to build the program’s curriculum for its first semester, she also embarked on a timely research project. Using existing data, she and her research partners sought to learn if last year’s protests were associated with increased COVID-19 hospitalizations in California counties.

Now, Dr. Bui’s research, titled “Public Protests and the Risk of Novel Coronavirus Disease Hospitalizations: A County-Level Analysis from California,” has been published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health. Working with Dr. Rachel L. Berkowitz from San José State University and a team of research scientists and analysts, the study did not find evidence of increased hospitalizations two weeks after protests.

Like many people, Dr. Bui was initially concerned that large protests would lead to spikes in COVID cases.

“The U.S. witnessed a dramatic increase in public protests in 2020 due to the stress of the pandemic and related preventive measures and the outrage over police violence against Black Americans particularly,” she explained. “Gatherings of large groups in protests could be viewed as counterproductive to preventing the spread of COVID-19. Therefore, understanding whether public protests impact community spread of COVID-19 can help to inform strategies and policies to ensure the safety of protesters and their communities both now and in the future.”

Dr. Bui and her team looked at available data in California, where protests occurred in 44 of the 55 counties included in the study from March 29 to Oct. 14, 2020. Using publicly available data sources and statistical modeling, the team found that the protests were not associated with a statistically significant spike in COVID hospitalizations two weeks later. Though the data available did not distinguish between masked and unmasked protests or include information on subsequent non-hospitalized COVID cases, the study still provides valuable information on the link between the protests of mid-to-late 2020 and severe cases of COVID-19 that required hospitalization.

“While our study has limitations in the interpretation of a causal relationship, the results do support the notion that it is possible to protest safely in the midst of a pandemic, ostensibly, so long as evidence-based precautionary measures are taken,” Dr. Bui said. “Future research is needed to examine the impacts of interventions to ensure preventive measures against COVID-19 transmission during protests.”

Kern County was one of the areas studied in the project. During the study period, Dr. Bui said, Kern County had 27 protests, more than 60 percent of which were for racial and social justice. The average daily COVID hospitalization rate in Kern County during the study period was 13.9 per 100,000 people. The region seemed to follow the greater state trend, with no significant increase in hospitalizations following those protests.

With COVID seeming to be around for the foreseeable future, it’s important to learn how best to live with it. To figure out how to do that, public health researchers like Dr. Bui have to study related phenomena as they happen, without the benefit that some distance from them might provide those who study these topics in the future.

“The COVID-19 pandemic is unprecedented,” Dr. Bui said. “The pandemic is ongoing, and we certainly learn more about it every day. Researchers like us try our best to answer questions or make recommendations from available data. We are excited to contribute to the knowledge about this pandemic.”