In low-income settings, women are vulnerable to the psychological distress caused by the social and economic impact of large-scale shocks (e.g., pandemics, natural disasters, political). This paper evaluates a randomized over-the-phone counseling intervention aimed at mitigating the mental...

Special Co-Vid 19 responses have been targeted to the elderly (of whatever age cut-off a politician designates) on the basis that age, itself, constitutes and a unique vulnerability to the disease. This Essay challenges that assumption on the basis of newer epidemiological evidence which I...

Public health experts have been predicting imminent threat of pandemic influenza. The latest US preparedness plans use the single statistic of case-fatality as the basis to evaluate any new threats. On this basis, Avian flu (H5N1) has been declared the single pandemic threat of concern, such...

The COVID-19 pandemic led to an unprecedented level of job losses in the U.S., where a job loss is also associated with the loss of health insurance. This paper uses data from the 2020 Household Pulse Survey (HPS) and difference-in-difference (DD) regressions to estimate the effect of the...

The health risks of the current COVID-19 pandemic, together with the drastic mitigation measures taken in many affected nations, pose an obvious threat to public mental health. The social science literature has already established a clear link between mental health and sociodemographic as well...

We study the impact of work loss on mental health during the COVID-19 pandemic. Combining data on work loss and health care consultations from comprehensive individual-level register data, we define groups of employees delineated by industry, region, age, and gender. With these groups, we use a...

Mental health disorders account for a significant share of the overall global disease burden. The economic losses from such disorders are staggeringly large, particularly in low-income countries, where people are faced with several unexpected shocks. We test whether improved communication can...

The COVID-19 pandemic continues to grow in the United States and, in the absence of a vaccine or effective treatment, social distancing measures are essential to slow the spread of this disease. Using cellular mobility data from 2019 and 2020, I demonstrate that there have been substantial...

Using data from the UK, we show that girls have been affected more than boys by the COVID-19 pandemic in terms of their mental wellbeing. These gender differences are more pronounced in lower-income families. Our results are consistent with previous findings of larger pandemic effects on mental...

Using data from the Growing Up in Ireland Covid survey, this study examines the evolution of mental health as measured in December 2020, nine months into the pandemic, compared to observations pre pandemic for two cohorts of people. A deterioration in mental health was observed for both cohorts...