Associate Professor of Applied Economics, Department of Economics and Business, University of Almeria, Carretera de Sacramento, s/n 04120, Almeria, Spain.
Eur J Health Econ. 2023 Feb;24(1):99-110. doi: 10.1007/s10198-022-01455-9. Epub 2022 Mar 9.
The main objective of this work is to analyze whether inequality in income distribution has an effect on COVID-19 incidence and mortality rates during the first wave of the pandemic, and how the public health system mitigates these effects. To this end, the case of 819 Spanish municipalities is used, and a linear cross-sectional model is estimated. The results obtained allow us to conclude that a higher level of income inequality generates a higher rate of infections but not deaths, highlighting the importance of the Spanish National Health Service, which does not distinguish by income level. Likewise, early detection of infection measured by the number of primary care centers per 100,000 inhabitants, access to health care for the treatment of the most severe cases, unemployment as a proxy for job insecurity, climatic conditions, and population density are also important factors that determine how COVID-19 affects the population.
本研究的主要目的是分析收入分配不平等是否会对大流行第一波期间的 COVID-19 发病率和死亡率产生影响，以及公共卫生系统如何减轻这些影响。为此，使用了 819 个西班牙市镇的案例，并对线性横截面模型进行了估计。研究结果表明，更高的收入不平等水平会导致更高的感染率，但不会导致更高的死亡率，突出了西班牙国家卫生系统的重要性，该系统不按收入水平区分。同样，通过每 10 万居民的初级保健中心数量衡量的感染早期检测、最严重病例治疗的医疗保健获取、作为工作不稳定指标的失业率、气候条件和人口密度也是决定 COVID-19 如何影响人口的重要因素。
