The impact of school closure intervention during the third wave of the COVID-19 pandemic in Italy: Evidence from the Milan area

Abstract

Background In February 2021, the spread of a new variant of SARS-CoV-2 in the Lombardy Region, Italy caused concerns about school-aged children as a source of contagion, leading local authorities to adopt an extraordinary school closure measure. This generated a debate about the usefulness of such an intervention in light of the trade-off between its related benefits and costs (e.g. delays in educational attainment, impact on children and families’ psycho-physical well-being). This article analyses the epidemiological impact of the school closure intervention in the Milan metropolitan area. Methods Data from the Agency for Health Protection of the Metropolitan City of Milan allowed analysing the trend of contagion in different age classes before and after the intervention, adopting an interrupted times series design, providing a quasi-experimental counterfactual scenario. Segmented Poisson regression models of daily incident cases were performed separately for the 3–11-year-old, the 12–19-year-old, and the 20+-year-old age groups, examining the change in the contagion curves after the intervention, adjusting for time-varying confounders. Kaplan-Meier survival curves and Cox regression were used to assess the equality of survival curves in the three age groups before and after the intervention. Results Net of time-varying confounders, the intervention produced a daily reduction of the risk of contagion by 4% in those aged 3–11 and 12–19 (IRR = 0·96) and by 3% in those aged 20 or more (IRR = 0·97). More importantly, there were differences in the temporal order of contagion decrease between the age groups, with the epidemic curve lowering first in the school-aged children directly affected by the intervention, and only subsequently in the adult population, which presumably indirectly benefitted from the reduction of contagion among children. Conclusion Though it was not possible to completely discern the effect of school closures from concurrent policy measures, a substantial decrease in the contagion curves was clearly detected after the intervention. The extent to which the slowdown of infections counterbalanced the social costs of the policy remains unclear.

Automated local lockdowns for SARS-CoV-2 epidemic control—assessment of effect by controlled interrupted time series analysis

“…Concerning the closure of educational institutions, most parishes did not have upper secondary schools or universities but did have primary and lower secondary schools affected by the lockdowns. Several previous studies have explored the specific effect of school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic using interrupted time series designs [8] , [9] , [10] and positive effects have been reported [8] , [9] , [10] , although Rotevatn et al . [8] in Oslo, Norway found that school closures were equally effective as targeted infection prevention and control measures in open schools in reducing student infection rates.…”

Evaluating the Effectiveness of School Closure in COVID-19–Related Syndromes From Community-Based Syndromic Surveillance: Longitudinal Observational Study

“…The school closure intervention produced a daily reduction in the risk of contagion by 4% in those aged 3-11 years and 12-19 years, and by 3% in those aged ≥20 years. The epidemic curve decreased first in school-aged children after the intervention and subsequently in the adult population [ 41 ].…”

Strategies for Engaging and Outreaching NEETs in Italy: Insights From Active Labour Policies

“…The closure of businesses, limited job openings, and increased competition for available positions have created a highly challenging environment for these young individuals (Carta & De Philippis, 2021;Cefalo & Scandurra, 2021). At the same time, the pandemic has disrupted educational systems, leading to school and university closures, remote learning challenges, and limited access to vocational training programs (Consolazio et al, 2022;Pastore & Choudhry, 2022;Pozzoli et al, 2022). This disruption has significantly impacted NEETs (Fiaschi & Tealdi, 2022), as they often lack the necessary qualifications and skills that employers demand .…”