Democracies are better at managing pandemics than autocracies, according to a new study by Airfinity
May 15 2024 - 6:49AM
Democratic nations tended to fare better during the pandemic with
fewer excess deaths than autocratic nations, according to new
analysis by Airfinity.
Today’s analysis is being presented at the Copenhagen Democracy
Summit by Airfinity’s CEO and founder Rasmus Bech Hansen. It shows
that for the vast majority of countries, strong democratic
government was a key predictor of lower excess deaths during the
pandemic. The analysis reveals China and Saudi Arabia were key
outliers in their approach and outcomes during the pandemic.
China, which followed a ‘zero-COVID policy’ had one of the
lowest excess deaths with 72 per 100k people. Saudi Arabia recorded
158 deaths per 100k people, while Russia had the highest with 943
deaths per 100k people. Denmark and Sweden had the lowest excess
deaths for democracies which did not have such stringent lockdowns
with 92 and 150 excess deaths per 100k people respectively.
Today’s analysis found the most significant contributing factor
to reducing excess deaths was the speed at which high performing
vaccines were rolled out. Measuring associated factors by Pearson’s
correlation coefficient, it shows vaccines had the greatest impact
on reducing deaths but the strength of a countries’ democracy had a
greater impact than healthcare expenditure.
Western democracies supported the development, production and
rollout of highly efficacious vaccines which was key to minimising
deaths. However production lagged behind China, which stepped in to
play a greater role in supplying vaccines to the rest of the world.
Global vaccine production capacity has almost tripled, to a peak of
14 billion doses a year in 2022, but much of this investment is
concentrated in Asia with dependencies on China.
Airfinity’s CEO and founder Rasmus Bech Hansen says, “Our
analysis shows that Western democracies did better than
non-democratic societies, simply put because they developed better
vaccines and were able to vaccinate their population relatively
fast. The innovation-ecosystem that Western economies have fostered
were critical in pandemic response”.
“Today’s assessment is not self congratulatory for Western
nations. Not all democracies did well and one reason could be low
trust in governments which leads to low voluntary vaccine uptake.
Lock-downs are a failure of pandemic preparedness. Although much
has been learned democracies are still very far from ready for a
new pandemic. There is a need for better disease surveillance,
detection and higher levels of R&D and stronger institutional
setup, potentially through NATO”.
“Democratic nations must be prepared for the next novel outbreak
to come, both so they can protect their own populations but also
for the rest of the world to turn to. The risk of inaction is that
China and other autocratic countries will step in to fill the
void.”
- Excess deaths vs democracy index analysis
- Correlation coefficients for key determinants against excess
deaths (G20 nations)
Airfinity Press Team
Airfinity
07773659099
press@airfinity.com