Cultural differences, intergenerational contacts, and the spread of Covid-19: Evidence from Swiss language regions

Fabrizio Mazzonna*, Nicolò Gatti, Nicolo' Gatti

*Autore corrispondente per questo lavoro

Risultato della ricerca: Contributo in rivistaArticolo in rivista

Abstract

The Covid-19 pandemic displayed large variations between and within countries in the speed of contagion and in observed fatality rates. This work sheds light on the role of social ties in old age, exploiting the high cultural variation between German-speaking and Latin- (French- and Italian-) speaking regions in Switzerland. We show that older adults in Latin-speaking regions exhibit a larger social network and more intergenerational contacts than their German-speaking counterparts. These differences are consistent with the heterogeneous incidence of the disease across language regions. Even controlling for several determinants of the contagion, we find large differences in the incidence of Covid-19 among older adults, in both the first and second waves of the pandemic. These findings also hold when exploiting language variations within the three Swiss bilingual cantons. We rule out the possibility that our results are driven by differences in canton-specific policies or in citizens' compliance with containment measures.
Lingua originaleEnglish
pagine (da-a)111-121
Numero di pagine11
RivistaPopulation Studies
Volume77
DOI
Stato di pubblicazionePubblicato - 2023

Keywords

  • Covid-19
  • Switzerland
  • culture
  • intergenerational contacts
  • policy compliance

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