The calculate_* functions are based on the OxCGRT’s methodology described here. There are two sets of calculate functions included in oxcgrt. The first calculates the OxCGRT sub-indices described in the table below:
| ID | Name | Description | Measurement | Coding | Policy Group |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | School closing | Record closings of schools and universities | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend closing or all schools open with alterations resulting in significant differences compared to non-Covid-19 operations; 2 - require closing (only some levels or categories, eg just high school, or just public schools); 3 - require closing all levels; Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C2 | Workplace closing | Record closings of workplaces | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend closing (or recommend work from home); 2 - require closing (or work from home) for some sectors or categories of workers; 3 - require closing (or work from home) for all-but-essential workplaces (eg grocery stores, doctors); Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C3 | Cancel public events | Record cancelling public events | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend cancelling; 2 - require cancelling; Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C4 | Restrictions on gatherings | Record limits on private gatherings | Ordinal scale | 0 - no restrictions; 1 - restrictions on very large gatherings (the limit is above; 1000 people); 2 - restrictions on gatherings between; 101-1000 people; 3 - restrictions on gatherings between; 11-100 people; 4 - restrictions on gatherings of; 10 people or less; Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C5 | Close public transport | Record closing of public transport | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend closing (or significantly reduce volume/route/means of transport available); 2 - require closing (or prohibit most citizens from using it); Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C6 | Stay at home requirements | Record orders to “shelter-in-place” and otherwise confine to the home | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend not leaving house; 2 - require not leaving house with exceptions for daily exercise, grocery shopping, and ‘essential’ trips; 3 - require not leaving house with minimal exceptions (eg allowed to leave once a week, or only one person can leave at a time, etc); Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C7 | Restrictions on internal movement | Record restrictions on internal movement between cities/regions | Ordinal scale | 0 - no measures; 1 - recommend not to travel between regions/cities; 2 - internal movement restrictions in place; Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| C8 | International travel controls | Record restrictions on international travel Note: this records policy for foreign travellers, not citizens | Ordinal scale | 0 - no restrictions; 1 - screening arrivals; 2 - quarantine arrivals from some or all regions; 3 - ban arrivals from some regions; 4 - ban on all regions or total border closure; Blank - no data | Containment and closure policies |
| E1 | Income support (for households) | Record if the government is providing direct cash payments to people who lose their jobs or cannot work. Note: only includes payments to firms if explicitly linked to payroll/salaries | Ordinal scale | 0 - no income support; 1 - government is replacing less than 50% of lost salary (or if a flat sum, it is less than 50% median salary); 2 - government is replacing 50% or more of lost salary (or if a flat sum, it is greater than 50% median salary); Blank - no data | Economic policies |
| E2 | Debt/contract relief (for households) | Record if the government is freezing financial obligations for households (eg stopping loan repayments, preventing services like water from stopping, or banning evictions) | Ordinal scale | 0 - no debt/contract relief; 1 - narrow relief, specific to one kind of contract; 2 - broad debt/contract relief | Economic policies |
| E3 | Fiscal measures | Announced economic stimulus spending Note: only record amount additional to previously announced spending | USD | Record monetary value in USD of fiscal stimuli, includes any spending or tax cuts NOT included in E4, H4 or H5; 0 - no new spending that day; Blank - no data | Economic policies |
| E4 | International support | Announced offers of Covid-19 related aid spending to other countries Note: only record amount additional to previously announced spending | USD | Record monetary value in USD; 0 - no new spending that day; Blank - no data | Economic policies |
| H1 | Public information campaigns | Record presence of public info campaigns | Ordinal scale | 0 - no Covid-19 public information campaign; 1 - public officials urging caution about Covid-19; 2- coordinated public information campaign (eg across traditional and social media); Blank - no data | Health system policies |
| H2 | Testing policy | Record government policy on who has access to testing Note: this records policies about testing for current infection (PCR tests) not testing for immunity (antibody test) | Ordinal scale | 0 - no testing policy; 1 - only those who both (a) have symptoms AND (b) meet specific criteria (eg key workers, admitted to hospital, came into contact with a known case, returned from overseas); 2 - testing of anyone showing Covid-19 symptoms; 3 - open public testing (eg “drive through” testing available to asymptomatic people); Blank - no data | Health system policies |
| H3 | Contact tracing | Record government policy on contact tracing after a positive diagnosis Note: we are looking for policies that would identify all people potentially exposed to Covid-19; voluntary bluetooth apps are unlikely to achieve this | Ordinal scale | 0 - no contact tracing; 1 - limited contact tracing; not done for all cases; 2 - comprehensive contact tracing; done for all identified cases | Health system policies |
| H4 | Emergency investment in healthcare | Announced short term spending on healthcare system, eg hospitals, masks, etc Note: only record amount additional to previously announced spending | USD | Record monetary value in USD; 0 - no new spending that day; Blank - no data | Health system policies |
| H5 | Investment in vaccines | Announced public spending on Covid-19 vaccine development Note: only record amount additional to previously announced spending | USD | Record monetary value in USD; 0 - no new spending that day; Blank - no data | Health system policies |
| H6 | Facial Coverings | Record policies on the use of facial coverings outside the home | Ordinal scale | 0 - No policy; 1 - Recommended; 2 - Required in some specified shared/public spaces outside the home with other people present, or some situations when social distancing not possible; 3 - Required in all shared/public spaces outside the home with other people present or all situations when social distancing not possible; 4 - Required outside the home at all times regardless of location or presence of other people | Health system policies |
| M1 | Wildcard | Record policy announcements that do not fit anywhere else | Free text notes field | Note unusual or interesting interventions that are worth flagging | Miscellaneous policies |
The second calculates the four OxCGRT indices which are composed of various combinations of the indicators described in the table above. These combinations are described in the table below:
| ID | Name | Government response index | Containment and health index | Stringency index | Economic support index |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C1 | School closing | x | x | x | |
| C2 | Workplace closing | x | x | x | |
| C3 | Cancel public events | x | x | x | |
| C4 | Restrictions on gatherings | x | x | x | |
| C5 | Close public transport | x | x | x | |
| C6 | Stay at home requirements | x | x | x | |
| C7 | Restrictions on internal movement | x | x | x | |
| C8 | International travel controls | x | x | x | |
| E1 | Income support (for households) | x | x | ||
| E2 | Debt/contract relief (for households) | x | x | ||
| E3 | Fiscal measures | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| E4 | International support | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| H1 | Public information campaigns | x | x | x | |
| H2 | Testing policy | x | x | ||
| H3 | Contact tracing | x | x | ||
| H4 | Emergency investment in healthcare | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| H5 | Investment in vaccines | NA | NA | NA | NA |
| H6 | Facial Coverings | x | x | ||
| M1 | Wildcard | NA | NA | NA | NA |
The OxCGRT subindices can be calculated using the calculate_subindex and calculate_subindices functions. To calculate a specific sub-index, the following code is used:
## Given the C1 data in indicatorData, calculate C1 sub-index
calculate_subindex(indicator_code = indicatorData[1, "indicator"],
value = indicatorData[1, "value"],
flag_value = indicatorData[1, "flag_value"])This gives a C1 index value of:
#> value
#> 1 66.66667To calculate all OxCGRT subindices, the following code is used:
## Given the indicatorData dataset, calculate all sub-indices
indicatorData %>%
calculate_subindices(indicator_code = "indicator",
value = "value",
flag_value = "flag_value",
add = TRUE)This results in the following output:
#> # A tibble: 14 x 7
#> indicator value flag_value max_value flag score score.1
#> <chr> <int> <int> <int> <int> <dbl> <dbl>
#> 1 C1 2 1 3 1 66.7 66.7
#> 2 C2 NA NA 3 1 0 0
#> 3 C3 2 0 2 1 75 75
#> 4 C4 2 0 4 1 37.5 37.5
#> 5 C5 0 NA 2 1 0 0
#> 6 C6 1 0 3 1 16.7 16.7
#> 7 C7 1 1 2 1 50 50
#> 8 C8 3 NA 4 0 75 75
#> 9 E1 2 0 2 1 75 75
#> 10 E2 2 NA 2 0 100 100
#> 11 H1 2 0 2 1 75 75
#> 12 H2 3 NA 3 0 100 100
#> 13 H3 2 NA 2 0 100 100
#> 14 H6 2 0 4 1 37.5 37.5It can be noted that the results of the calculations are added to the input data.frame under the column name score.1. Comparing this with the value in the column named score that is included in the indicatorData dataset, the results are the same.
The OxCGRT indices can be calculated using the calculate_index and calculate_indices functions. To calculate a specific sub-index, the following code can be used:
indicatorData %>%
calculate_subindices(indicator_code = "indicator",
value = "value",
flag_value = "flag_value",
add = FALSE) %>%
calculate_index(codes = c(paste("C", 1:8, sep = ""),
paste("E", 1:2, sep = ""),
paste("H", 1:3, sep = ""),
"H6"),
tolerance = 1)This code calculates the government response index which is:
#> [1] 57.7381The same result can be reached by using the specialised function calculate_gov_response as follows:
indicatorData %>%
calculate_subindices(indicator_code = "indicator",
value = "value",
flag_value = "flag_value",
add = FALSE) %>%
calculate_gov_response()which results in the same value as the previous code:
#> [1] 57.7381To calculate all four OxCGRT indices, the following code can be implemented:
indicatorData %>%
calculate_subindices(indicator_code = "indicator",
value = "value",
flag_value = "flag_value",
add = FALSE) %>%
calculate_indices()which outputs the following results:
#> # A tibble: 4 x 2
#> index values
#> <chr> <dbl>
#> 1 Government Response Index 57.7
#> 2 Containment and Health Index 52.8
#> 3 Stringency Index 44.0
#> 4 Economic Support Index 87.5