Thursday,
April 23, 2020 / 08:30 AM / By FDC Ltd / Header Image Credit: The Times Of Israel
Covid-19
continues to ravage both developed and developing economics, heightening the
risk of an economic recession. In the last five months, the number of global
confirmed cases skyrocketed to over 2million with death cases rising to
approximately 140,000. The US, Spain, Italy, Germany and France were the most
hit countries while Libya, Benin, Gambia, Mauritania and Botswana were mildly
affected. For Nigeria in particular, the total number of confirmed cases
increased to over 400 with fatal cases crossing the single digit band.
The
rapid spread of the virus has forced countries to deduce a correlation between
the fatalities and socio-economic indicators such as life expectancy and median
age as well as climatic conditions such as temperature. For instance, Italy
with a life expectancy of 83.6 years, median age of 45.5 years and temperature
of 13.45oC was one of the most hit economies while Benin with a life expectancy
of 61.5 years, median age of 18.2 years and temperature of 27.55oC was among
the least affected countries. It is in this light we sought to establish the
correlation between fatal cases and the socioeconomic indicators and climate
conditions of 20 countries. The observations consist of the 10 most hit
economies and the 10 least economies.
From
the table above, there seems to be a strong positive correlation between life
expectancy and fatalities as well median age and fatalities. This suggests that
countries with high life expectancy and median age tend to be vulnerable to
Covid-19 death. This is likely because these countries have a high aged
population with low immune system and possible pre-existing health conditions.
Also, there seems to be a negative correlation between temperature and
fatalities. By implication, countries with hot and humid weather tend to be
less vulnerable to Covid-19 death.
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