Stringency and timeliness of COVID‐19 policies in managing the pandemic in Queensland: Lessons from 2020

• Published date: 01 December 2023
• Author: Jessica Vogler,Lucy Tudehope,Hai Phung,Natalie Reyes Bernard,Ernesta Sofija
• Date: 01 December 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1002/wmh3.569

Received: 20 November 2022

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Revised: 23 March 2023

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Accepted: 27 March 2023

DOI: 10.1002/wmh3.569

RESEARCH ARTICLE

Stringency and timeliness of COVID‐19

policies in managing the pandemic in

Queensland: Lessons from 2020

Jessica Vogler|Lucy Tudehope|Hai Phung|

Natalie Reyes Bernard|Ernesta Sofija

School of Medicine and Dentistry, Griffith

University, Southport, Queensland, Australia

Correspondence

Jessica Vogler, School of Medicine and

Dentistry (Public Health), Griffith University,

Southport, QLD, 4215, Australia.

Email: Jessica.Vogler@griffithuni.edu.au

Abstract

Queensland experienced relatively low case numbers

during the first year of the coronavirus disease 2019

(COVID‐19) pandemic. This may be due to timely,

stringent policies, yet there is currently no research

evaluating this link, despite the state government playing

such a primary role in the pandemic response. This

ecological study used a cross‐sectional design to

examine the stringency and timeliness of Queensland's

containment policies and their impact on COVID‐19

cases in 2020. To achieve this, the authors generated a

stringency index for Queensland in 2020 in line with the

Oxford COVID‐19 Government Response Tracker

(OxCGRT) method, since these data were not available

at the time. The national context was also provided by

examining the relationship between case numbers and

policies in Australia. The findings demonstrated a

statistically significant relationship between policy strin-

gency and case numbers in both Australia and Queens-

land. While Australia experienced two waves of COVID‐

19 in 2020, Queensland only experienced one. In terms

of timeliness, there was a reactive approach to the first

wave, with rapid escalation of policy stringency in both

Queensland and Australia as a whole. Queensland's

ability to prevent a second wave in 2020 may be due to a

more systematic, gradual de‐escalation of policies and

the maintenance of strategies such as interstate border

controls. This study suggests that preventing the

reintroduction of new cases after a period of elimination

is important. Recommendations are made for the

World Med. & Health Policy. 2023;15:570–586.570

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wileyonlinelibrary.com/journal/wmh3

This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and

reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

© 2023 The Authors. World Medical & Health Policy published by Wiley Periodicals LLC on behalf of Policy Studies Organization.

application and interpretation of the stringency index.

Further research is needed to understand the relation-

ship between de‐escalation strategies and outcomes.

KEYWORDS

COVID, OxCGRT stringency index, policy

Key points

•Approaches to de‐escalating containment policies

following an initial wave of cases should be evaluated

to ensure gradual de‐escalation.

•Measures that delay re‐entry of the virus to the state

are likely to reduce case numbers.

•Rapid response to community transmission is vital in

preventing further waves of cases.

INTRODUCTION

Did containment polices help to reduce case numbers during the coronavirus disease 2019

(COVID‐19) pandemic? This is a question that has been researched extensively at the

international level, with several studies finding a relationship between containment policies

and infection rates across multiple geographic regions (Cross et al., 2020; Ma et al., 2021).

Yet, in decentralized federations such as Australia, where statutory powers for health sit

largely with state and territory governments, examination of subnational data may provide a

more nuanced picture. The state of Queensland, Australia, with a population of just over 5

million, experienced relatively low COVID‐19 case numbers in the first year of the pandemic

compared with other Australian jurisdictions (Australian Bureau of Statistics, 2020a;

Department of Health, 2020). It is possible that this is due to the timeliness and stringency

of Queensland's COVID‐19 containment policies, yet this has not previously been

researched.

On January 29, 2020, the first Queensland case of COVID‐19 was confirmed. On that

same day, the Honorable Annastacia Palaszczuk, Premier of Queensland, became the first

Australian leader to declare COVID‐19 a public health emergency under the Public Health

Act 2005 (Qld) (Edwards et al., 2022). What ensued in the following months was a set of

stringent closure and containment policies aimed at “flattening the curve,”beginning with

restrictions on mass gatherings and the closure of nonessential businesses, and later

escalated with interstate border restrictions and quarantine requirements (Edwards

et al., 2022; Miles, 2020). At the end of March, stay‐at‐home orders were implemented,

although schools remained open for children of “essential workers,”with all other students

not required to study for the remainder of the school term (Palaszczuk & Grace, 2020;

Ryan, 2020; Storen & Corrigan, 2020). Less than 2 months later, the Queensland Premier

released a roadmap for the staged easing of restrictions beginning from May 15, including

the easing of stay‐at‐home orders and limits on gatherings and movement

(Palaszczuk, 2020). This was further expanded in October, with the easing of border

restrictions, increases in the size of gatherings, and unseated eating and drinking permitted

at venues with a “COVID Safe Plan”(Palaszczuk & Miles, 2020). By the end of 2020,

Queensland's total cases per 100,000 sat at 24.22, with 0.12 deaths per 100,000

(Department of Health, 2020). This is a feat scarcely seen in other jurisdictions of

Queensland's size (McKenna, 2020). For example, by the end of 2020 the state of Victoria,

with a similarly sized jurisdiction, had recorded 304.23 COVID‐19 cases per 100,000 and

TIMELINESS OF QUEENSLAND'S COVID‐19 POLICIES

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