Social, Economic and Demographic Factors Determining COVID-19 Incidence and Mortality. An Ecological Analysis of 172 Countries

Wide differences in countries’ COVID-19 development have been reported worldwide. The aim of this study is dual: i) to describe whether social, economic and demographic factors determine the total cases and deaths per million inhabitants among countries and ii) to group countries according to their similarities regarding those relevant factors, creating clusters that reflect the risk of high COVID-19 cases and deaths. To that purpose, we used Ordinary Least Square regression models and Ward’s hierarchical clustering method. The results showed that countries with older populations, higher GDP per capita and more physicians per thousand inhabitants registered more COVID-19 cases per million inhabitants, while more COVID-19 deaths per million inhabitants were reported in countries with old populations and higher social inequity reports, measured through Gini’s coefficient. When combining social, economic, and demographic variables to create groups according to COVID-19 risk, we found that countries in Central Africa showed the least risk, while countries in Asia, Europe and North America belonged to the most endangered group.Funding: None to declare. Declaration of Interests: The authors declare that they have no financial nor personal interests that could have influenced this study.