Exeter UK January 7 ANI According to a new study, countries with more trust in each other have been more successful in bringing down the waves of coronaviruses cases and deaths.
There is a threshold effect in countries where at least 40 per cent of people agree that most people can be trusted This supported an effective reduction of cases and deaths during 2020.
In previous studies, the UK's trust in the UK is at the critical 40 per cent compared to more than 60 per cent in Scandinavian countries. China has high levels of trust within society.
The researchers found that trusting societies tended to achieve a slower decline in infections and deaths from peak levels as a result of the coronaviruses data during 2020.
It's likely that behaviours that are vital to stopping the spread of COVID 19 such as mask-wearing and social distancing depend on mutual trust to be effective.
The study was conducted by Professor Tim Lenton and Dr Chris Boulton from the University of Exeter and Professor Marten Scheffer from Wageningen University.
Our results show that trust within society benefits from epidemics, according to Professor Lenton. This is a long-term project for all nations because it will help them cope with future pandemics and other challenges caused by climate change. The government intervention on the coronaviruses isn't straightforward, according to the study. Most governments have applied similar stringent restrictions but they have varying success in bringing down case numbers and deaths. There was a reason why more stringent governments were associated with less trusting societies.
The researchers measured more than 150 countries' resilience to COVID-19 as the nationwide decay rate of daily cases or deaths from peak levels, using information from the Our World in Data COVID 19 dataset up to 1 December 2020 - before vaccines were available.
Resilience to COVID 19 varied by a factor of 40 between countries for cases capita and a factor of 25 for deaths per capita.
More than 40 per cent of respondents agreed that most people can be trusted with a near-complete reduction of new cases and deaths. So did some less trusting societies - indicating that trust in each other is only one of several factors at play.