Publication Type

Journal Article

Version

publishedVersion

Publication Date

1-2022

Abstract

The novel coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has caused a global pandemic. Some studies have suggested a negative association between sunlight intensity and COVID-19 infection, alluding to the belief that it might be safe to go out on sunny days. This paper examined whether solar radiation mitigated the association between human mobility and COVID-19 infection in Europe using a dynamic panel data model to investigate the effect of human mobility, solar radiation, and their interaction on COVID-19 infection. The results revealed that outgoing mobility was positively correlated and solar radiation was negatively correlated with COVID-19 infection at lag levels of 1, 2, and 3 weeks. The coefficients of the interaction items indicated that solar radiation negatively moderated the relationship between outgoing mobility and the number of daily new confirmed cases at 2- and 3-week lag levels. However, the moderating effect was limited and unable to eliminate the positive effect of outgoing mobility on COVID-19 infection. Thus, these results suggested that solar radiation only weakly mitigated the relationship between human mobility and COVID-19 infection, providing policy implications that mobility should still be restricted on sunny days during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Keywords

COVID-19, Human mobility, Moderating effect, Solar radiation

Discipline

Operations and Supply Chain Management | Place and Environment | Public Health

Research Areas

Operations Management

Publication

Environmental Science and Pollution Research

Volume

29

Issue

1

First Page

828

Last Page

835

ISSN

0944-1344

Identifier

10.1007/s11356-021-15738-w

Publisher

Springer

Copyright Owner and License

Authors

Additional URL

https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-021-15738-w

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