Janousek Publishes Journal Article on COVID-19 Public Health Policy in United States

Christian Janousek, JD, PhD, assistant professor in the Department of Political Science and International Relations, recently published a co-authored research article in the journal COVID (August 2024). The co-author of the article is Shihyun Noh, PhD (SUNY Brockport).

The title of the article is, “State Contexts for a Public Health Emergency: The Divergence of Politics and Administration in COVID-19 Vaccination Rates.”

The study explores the political and administrative influences contributing to differences in COVID-19 public health policy outcomes among the U.S. states. Focusing on COVID-19 vaccination rate as a measure of policy execution, the research incorporated four hypotheses to address the overall effect of the politics–administration contexts of states in the pandemic response. The political dispositions of state elected officials and the state administrative structures and capacity attributes for public health were examined. The findings suggest that state political leadership, namely the party affiliation of governors, along with the fiscal capacity of the state GDP display significant associations with state COVID-19 vaccination rate disparities, while other indicators of administrative design and aptitude did not.