AN INVESTIGATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POVERTY, POLLUTION, PREVENTIVE ACTIONS AND THE PROGRESSION OF COVID-19 IN BURKINA FASO

Last registered on July 14, 2021
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
AN INVESTIGATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POVERTY, POLLUTION, PREVENTIVE ACTIONS AND THE PROGRESSION OF COVID-19 IN BURKINA FASO
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0007957
Initial registration date
July 13, 2021

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
July 14, 2021, 10:13 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Locations

Country
Burkina Faso
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Elodie DJEMAI
Affiliation
Université Paris-Dauphine
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

PI Name
Philippe DE VREYER
PI Affiliation
Université Paris-Dauphine
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Thomas THIVILLON
PI Affiliation
Université Paris-Dauphine
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Adama SANA
PI Affiliation
INSP/Centre Muraz
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Abdramane BERTHE
PI Affiliation
Centre Muraz
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Dramane KANIA
PI Affiliation
Centre Muraz
Contact Investigator
PI Name
Hermann BADOLO
PI Affiliation
INSP/Centre Muraz
Contact Investigator

Additional Trial Information

Status
On going
Start date
2021-06-07
End date
2022-05-31
Keywords
Behavior, Health
Additional Keywords
Coronavirus, Prevention, Information, Liquidity constraint, Air pollution
JEL code(s)
Secondary IDs
Abstract
This project investigates the determinants of COVID-19 transmission in Burkina Faso with a focus on behavioural and environmental factors. We exploit a baseline survey conducted among 830 households in three cities of the Southern Central region three months before the COVID-19 epidemic to understand how the risk of contracting the disease is affected by an individual's access to information on preventive actions, by the household's budget constraint and by exposure to air pollution (PM2.5). To shed light on this relationship, we will conduct a randomized experiment in which an information treatment aimed at addressing informational market failures will be cross-randomized with unconditional cash transfers designed to incentivize households to adopt preventive actions (regular handwashing, wearing face masks). All sampled households will be re-interviewed pre and post intervention to document disease related learning processes as well as changes in preventive behaviours. Serological tests will be conducted in all adult individuals belonging to the sample before and after the intervention. Data on individual exposure to particulate matters collected for 550 individuals during the baseline survey at the end of 2019 will be leveraged to explore the relationship between air pollution and the incidence of severe cases of COVID-19 and collected again before the intervention. The panel dataset which will be available at the end of the study will significantly contribute to improving our understanding of the reach of the COVID-19 epidemic in Burkina Faso and will inform public health and environmental policies aimed at containing future outbreaks of coronavirus.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
BADOLO, Hermann et al. 2021. "AN INVESTIGATION OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN POVERTY, POLLUTION, PREVENTIVE ACTIONS AND THE PROGRESSION OF COVID-19 IN BURKINA FASO." AEA RCT Registry. July 14. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.7957-1.0
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Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
A randomized controlled trial experiment will be conducted in 2021. Sampled households will be divided into four experimental groups to be defined according to two treatment arms: information and unconditional cash transfers.
* Information treatment
The information treatment arm splits the sample into two groups: treated or untreated. Households assigned into the information treated group will receive information about the coronavirus. Two videos will be shown after the first follow-up survey. Treated households will receive audio messages on their mobile phone on a weekly basis for 12 weeks (between the two follow-up surveys).
* Unconditional Cash Transfers
Participants will receive unconditional cash transfers on their mobile phone. The timing of the transfers is randomly assigned at the household level. Half of the households will receive transfers once a month during the intervention period, half of the households will receive one transfer at the end of the intervention period, after the second follow-up survey.
The amount of the transfer will be based on the household size and composition to cover the monthly cost of COVID-19 -related protection, namely buying masks and additional soap. For households assigned to the group that receives the transfer at the end of the period, the amount will be equivalent to the sum of the three months of transfers they would have received if assigned to the other group.
Intervention Start Date
2021-07-13
Intervention End Date
2021-11-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
• the level of knowledge about coronavirus
• the likelihood of adopting preventive behaviours regarding coronavirus
• disease occurrence
• the willingness to get immunized against COVID-19.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)
The following individual indicators will describe the level of knowledge about coronavirus:
- Correct knowledge regarding symptoms
- Correct knowledge regarding means of transmission
- Correct knowledge regarding means of prevention
- Ignorance about symptoms
- Ignorance about means of transmission
- Ignorance about means of prevention

The following individual indicators will measure the likelihood of adopting preventive behaviours:
- Wearing a mask
- Hand washing
- Avoiding crowded areas
- Avoiding shaking hands
- Keeping the distance

To measure disease occurrence., the following indicators are considered:
- Self-declared indicators: declared occurrence of covid19-related symptoms during the last three months (cough, fever, …)
- Self-declared hospitalisation during the last four weeks
- Biomarker: rapid detection test (serological test) to detect whether each household member (aged 15 years old or more) has developed COVID-19 antibodies.

The willingness to get immunized against COVID-19 will be measured through
- Self-declared willingness to get immunized against COVID-19
- Having been immunized against COVID-19

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
If our treatments increase prevention and reduce infection, it might have impacts on secondary outcomes such that living conditions, food security, education outcomes, time use.
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
The final sample size is 830 households, and about 4400 household members.

Four experimental groups will be defined as follow.
Group 1 (207 households): Households randomly assigned to group 1 will receive three transfer, one per month, and will watch the videos and receive twelve sensitization messages on their mobile phone, one per week.
Group 2 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 2 will receive one transfer at the end of the intervention period, and will watch the videos and receive twelve sensitization messages on their mobile phone, one per week.
Group 3 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 3 will receive three transfer, one per month.
Group 4 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 4 will receive one transfer at the end of the period. This group stands for the control group.

Both the randomisation of the transfer arm and the randomisation of the information arm will be at the household level. The stratification will be at the city level only.
Experimental Design Details
The study participants are the households sampled for the baseline survey collected between December 2019 and March 2020 in three cities (South of Ouagadougou), namely Kombissiri, Manga and Pô. The sample was randomly drawn using a geographical sampling design: GPS points were drawn in the three localities and interviewers had to follow a pre-defined procedure to sample one household per GPS point. The final sample size is 830 households, and about 4400 household members. Households were eligible if they do not use gas nor electricity for cooking purpose, because the baseline survey is part of the REDGAS project . Over the 831 sampled households at baseline, 233 live in Kombissiri, 242 live in Manga and 356 live in Pô.
To increase the tracing of the sampled households during the successive waves, the enumerators will use the address, GPS point of the household’s location, and the phone number listed during the previous round of data collection. To keep the sample size constant through the project, a replacement strategy has been defined in case sampled households migrate to another city or refuse to participate in the follow-up surveys.
*Assignment of treatments: Four experimental groups will be defined as follow.
Group 1 (207 households): Households randomly assigned to group 1 will receive three transfer, one per month, and will watch the videos and receive twelve sensitization messages on their mobile phone, one per week.
Group 2 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 2 will receive one transfer at the end of the intervention period, and will watch the videos and receive twelve sensitization messages on their mobile phone, one per week.
Group 3 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 3 will receive three transfer, one per month.
Group 4 (208 households): Households randomly assigned to group 4 will receive one transfer at the end of the period. This group stands for the control group.

Both the randomisation of the transfer arm and the randomisation of the information arm will be at the household level. The stratification will be at the city level only. We will have about 208 households per group. Power calculations suggest that defining the information treatment group at the cluster level to avoid spill-overs and contamination of the control group would require a large sample size.
Randomization Method
Randomization done in office by a computer
Randomization Unit
Units of randomization: households
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
na.
Sample size: planned number of observations
830 households
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
208
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Institutional Review Board, Paris School of Economics
IRB Approval Date
2021-05-31
IRB Approval Number
2019-011
IRB Name
Comité d'Ethique pour la Recherche en Santé (CERS), Burkina Faso
IRB Approval Date
2020-07-01
IRB Approval Number
2020-7-132
Analysis Plan

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Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials