Assessment of Epidemiological Determinants of COVID-19 Pandemic Related to Social and Economic Factors Globally

Mohammad Mahmudul Hassan,Ariful Islam,Shahneaz Ali Khan,Md Raihan Khan Nayem,Shahanaj Shano,Md Abul Kalam,Md Kaisar Rahman

doi:10.3390/jrfm13090194

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has manifested more than a health crisis and has severely impacted on social, economic, and development crises in the world. The relationship of COVID-19 with countries’ economic and other demographic statuses is an important criterion with which to assess the impact of this current outbreak. Based on available data from the online platform, we tested the hypotheses of a country’s economic status, population density, the median age of the population, and urbanization pattern influence on the test, attack, case fatality, and recovery rates of COVID-19. We performed correlation and multivariate multinomial regression analysis with relative risk ratio (RRR) to test the hypotheses. The correlation analysis showed that population density and test rate had a significantly negative association (r = −0.2384, p = 0.00). In contrast, the median age had a significant positive correlation with recovery rate (r = 0.4654, p = 0.00) and case fatality rate (r = 0.2847, p = 0.00). The urban population rate had a positive significant correlation with recovery rate (r = 0.1610, p = 0.04). Lower-middle-income countries had a negative significant correlation with case fatality rate (r= −0.3310, p = 0.04). The multivariate multinomial logistic regression analysis revealed that low-income countries are more likely to have an increased risk of case fatality rate (RRR = 0.986, 95% Confidence Interval; CI = 0.97−1.00, p < 0.05) and recovery rate (RRR = 0.967, 95% CI = 0.95–0.98, p = 0.00). The lower-income countries are more likely to have a higher risk in case of attack rate (RRR = 0.981, 95% CI = 0.97–0.99, p = 0.00) and recovery rate (RRR = 0.971, 95% CI = 0.96–0.98, p = 0.00). Similarly, upper middle-income countries are more likely to have higher risk in case of attack rate (RRR = 0.988, 95% CI = 0.98–1.0, p = 0.01) and recovery rate (RRR = 0.978, 95% CI = 0.97–0.99, p = 0.00). The low- and lower-middle-income countries should invest more in health care services and implement adequate COVID-19 preventive measures to reduce the risk burden. We recommend a participatory, whole-of-government and whole-of-society approach for responding to the socio-economic challenges of COVID-19 and ensuring more resilient and robust health systems to safeguard against preventable deaths and poverty by improving public health outcomes.

Highlights

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), or COVID-19, has affected the advancement of humans’ usual lifestyles, and the whole world is fighting against an invisible enemy
The analysis revealed that the correlation of population density and test rate had weak but significantly negative association (r = −0.2384, p = 0.00)
The analysis revealed that the correlation of countries’ population density with attack rate, case fatality rate, and recovery rate was insignificant negatively associated (r = −0.0175, p = 0.82; r = −0.0502, p = 0.52 and r = −0.0506, p = 0.52, respectively), demonstrates a weak relationship

Summary

Introduction

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2), or COVID-19, has affected the advancement of humans’ usual lifestyles, and the whole world is fighting against an invisible enemy. As of 11:04 am CEST, 16 July 2020, there have been 13,338,364 confirmed cases of COVID-19, including 579,319 deaths officially reported by the WHO (WHO 2020). Due to the lunar year celebration in China, the massive movement of people from and between the Asian region and other parts of the world increased the geographical spreading of this contagion immediately at the point of the outbreak (Boulos and Geraghty 2020). The disease has spread throughout the world, and it has become a global pandemic with ongoing devastating effects continuing (Zheng 2020). Travel from the affected areas is one of the main causes of the spread of this disease between countries throughout the world (Gössling et al 2020). Though the size and persistence of the economic impact is unanswerable, the global spread of COVID-19 has the potential to derail the world economy (Baldwin and Mauro 2020). There are potential direct consequences of COVID-19 on mental stress and indirect effects associated with psychiatric complications (Temsah et al 2020; Vindegaard and Benros 2020)

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