Purpose Evaluate the correlation between state mandated social interventions and Covid-19 mortality Design Prospective design and retrospective analysis of Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) state data. Methods Twelve European Union countries were selected on April 12, 2020 from IHME data which had clearly defined and dated establishment of statewide mandates for social distancing measures to include: School closures, stay at home orders, severe travel restrictions, and closure of non-essential businesses. The state Covid-19 mortality prevalence was defined as total normalized deaths to the peak daily mortality rate. The state mortality prevalence was correlated to the total number of mandates-days from their date of establishment to the peak daily mortality date. The slope of the maximum daily mortality rate was also correlated to mandate-days. Results The slope of standardized mortality per country did have a slight negative correlation to the total mandate days (R2 = 0.083, p= 0.36), though the negative correlation was not statistically significant. The standardized mortality prevalence to the peak mortality rate per country exhibited no discernable statistical correlation to the total mandate days (R2 = 0.004,p=0.85). Discussion The analysis appears to suggest a mandate effective reduction in the slope of the mortality rate, but no effective reduction in Covid-19 mortality to its defined initial peak when interpreting the mean-effect of the mandates as present in the data. The study is presented as a potential methodology to evaluate the effectiveness of state mandated social distancing policy.

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Academics frequently serve as expert witnesses in legal cases, yet their role as transmitters of social scientific knowledge remains under-examined. The present study analyzes the deployment of social science within British Columbia's polygamy reference trial where research is used to support the assertion that polygamy is inherently harmful to society. Within the trial record and the written decision, the protection of monogamy as an institution is performed in part through the marginalization of qualitative methodology and the concurrent privileging of quantitative studies that purportedly demonstrate widespread social harms associated with the practice of polygyny.

Background: Evaluate the correlation between U.S. state mandated social interventions and Covid-19 mortality using a retrospective analysis of Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) data. Methods: Twenty-seven (27) states in the United States were selected on June 17, 2020 from IHME data which had clearly defined and dated establishment of statewide mandates for social distancing measures to include: School closures, Prohibition on mass gatherings, business closures, stay at home orders, severe travel restrictions, and closure of non-essential businesses. The state Covid-19 mortality prevalence was defined as total normalized deaths to the peak daily mortality rate. The state mortality prevalence was correlated to the total number of mandates-days from their date of establishment to the peak daily mortality date. The slope of the maximum daily mortality rate was also correlated to mandate-days. Results: The standardized mortality per state to the initial peak mortality rate did not demonstrate a discernable correlation to the total mandate days (R2 = 0.000006, p= 0.995). The standardized peak mortality rate per state suggested a slight correlation to the total mandate days (R2 = 0.053,p=0.246), but was not statistically significant. There was a significant correlation between standardized mortality and state population density (R2 = 0.524,p=0.00002). Conclusions: The analysis appears to suggest no mandate effective reduction in Covid-19 mortality nor a reduction in Covid-19 mortality rate to its defined initial peak when interpreting the mean-effect of the mandates as present in the data. A strong correlation to population density suggests human interaction frequency does affect the total mortality and maximum mortality rate.

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