Abstract
COVID-19 was characterized by the WHO as a pandemic on March 11, 2020. In Sergipe, northeastern Brazil, the first case was diagnosed on March 14, 2020. This study is part of analyzes on the first year of the pandemic of COVID-19 in Sergipe and aims to analyze, through an ecological study, deaths from the disease in its 75 municipalities, statistically correlating the crude and age-standardized mortality rates with indicators of social vulnerability and human development used in the country; and with the demographic density of the municipalities in the state. Mortality data were obtained by dividing the absolute number of deaths by the number of inhabitants in each municipality. Direct standardization of mortality rates and Spearman correlation ( ρ ) were performed to test the described correlation. The study demonstrated a different correlation from that found in the literature between the Municipal Human Development Index and deaths by COVID-19: the greater the development, the more deaths by COVID-19 were identified. The effects of these indicators may be being offset by factors such as the greater demographic density of the cities with greater development, which could favor the transmission of the disease.
Highlights
At the end of the year 2019, a new coronavirus was identified as the cause of a number of cases of pneumonia in Wuhan, China, causing the emission of a warning by the World Health Organization (WHO)
In Sergipe, a state located in northeastern Brazil, the first case was diagnosed on March 14, 2020 (Secretaria de Estado da Saúde de Sergipe, 2020)
Direct standardization by age used as reference the projection of the population of each city in 2020 and the standardization of age rates for the world population proposed by the World Health Organization (Ahmad et al, 2001) The indicators used to correlate with age-standardized mortality rates were the Social Vulnerability Index and the Municipal Human Development Index, built by the Institute of Applied Economic Research
Summary
At the end of the year 2019, a new coronavirus was identified as the cause of a number of cases of pneumonia in Wuhan, China, causing the emission of a warning by the World Health Organization (WHO). Following the progress of the disease, it was the first diagnosed case of COVID- 19 in South America in Brazil, recorded on February 26, 2020, in the city of São Paulo (Cavalcante & Abreu, 2020). In Sergipe, a state located in northeastern Brazil, the first case was diagnosed on March 14, 2020 (Secretaria de Estado da Saúde de Sergipe, 2020). According to the Epidemiological Report published on March 14, 2021 (Secretaria de Estado da Saúde de Sergipe, 2021), the panorama of the disease in Sergipe had 158,800 cases of the disease and 3,123 deaths as a result
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