What is it about?

The spread of communicable diseases, such as COVID-19, has a detrimental effect on our socioeconomic structure. We investigated the long-term interdependence of communicable disease spread, economic prosperity, greenhouse gas emissions, and government health expenditures in India’s densely populated economy.

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Why is it important?

Using a variance error correction (VEC) model, we predict the long-run dynamic inter-relationship between communicable and other disease-related fatalities (disease spread), economic prosperity (GNI),GHG emissions, and government health policy (expenditure). Also, we argue that, in an economy with forward-thinking agents, the dynamic long-term relationship between the spread of communicable diseases and other explanatory variables means that all variables must be endogenous. Our idea is directly derived from Sims’ critique (Sims 1980), which states that no variable can be considered exogenous in a world containing rational, forward-thinking agents. According to Sims, the prevalent economic models made substantial assumptions about the dynamic nature of the interaction between macro-economic factors. They are also largely inconsistent with the belief that economic agents consider the impact of today’s decisions on tomorrow’s utility. Sims offered “vector autoregression models (VARs)” as a solution that allowed one to model macroeconomic data in an informative manner while imposing few constraints. Finally, India’s climatic and socio-economic factors make it an excellent location for propagating and nourishing hazardous viruses. By examining the dynamic relationship between communicable disease spread, GHG emissions, economic prosperity (GNI), and health policy in an important developing country like India, we can be much better prepared to control and mitigate potential future contagious pandemics like COVID-19.

Perspectives

In my opinion, our article can assist researchers and policymakers in better preparing to control the spread of communicable pandemics such as COVID-19.

Dr. Muhammad Jawad Sajid
Xuzhou Institute of Technology

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This page is a summary of: The long-term dynamic relationship between communicable disease spread, economic prosperity, greenhouse gas emissions, and government health expenditures: preparing for COVID-19-like pandemics, Environmental Science and Pollution Research, November 2022, Springer Science + Business Media,
DOI: 10.1007/s11356-022-23984-9.
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