Closure of Anchor businesses Reduced COVID-19 Transmission during the Early months of the pandemic

Objectives:To investigate the relationship between the closure of "anchor businesses"- manufacturing plants and distribution centers employing >1000 workers - and the daily, county-level COVID-19 rate between March 1, 2020 and May 31, 2020.Methods:We conducted a comparative, interrupted time series analysis of publicly available county-level data. Our main variable of interest was closure, indicating whether one or more of the anchor businesses within the county experienced a full or partial closure of at least 22days (main analysis) or at least 1 day (sensitivity analyses).Results:Closure of an anchor business was associated with 142 fewer positive COVID-19 tests per 100,000 population over a 40-day period. Even short-term and partial closures were associated with reduced spread.Conclusions:Temporary closure of anchor businesses appears to have slowed, but not completely contained, the spread of COVID-19.