Predicting cases and deaths in Europe from COVID-19 tests and country populations
Document Type
Journal Article
Publication Title
Annals of Financial Economics
Volume
15
Issue
4
Publisher
World Scientific
School
School of Business and Law
RAS ID
45121
Funders
Australian Research Council
Abstract
The paper presents a critical analysis of the European spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes the COVID-19 disease across 48 European countries and territories, including the Monaco and Andorra principalities and Vatican City. Simple cross-sectional regressions, using country populations, are able to predict quite accurately both the total number of cases and deaths, which cast doubt on measures aimed at controlling the disease via lockdowns. This throws into sharp contrast the relative effectiveness of the attempts to risk manage the spread of the virus by ‘flattening the curve’ of the speed of transmission, and the efficacy of lockdowns in terms of the spread of the disease and death rates. The algorithmic techniques, results and analysis presented in the paper should prove useful to the medical and health professions, science advisers and risk management and decision making of healthcare by state, regional and national governments in all countries in Europe.
DOI
10.1142/S2010495220500177
Access Rights
subscription content
Comments
Allen, D. E., & McAleer, M. (2020). Predicting cases and deaths in europe from Covid-19 tests and country populations. Annals of Financial Economics, 15(04), 2050017. https://doi.org/10.1142/S2010495220500177