Death takes no bribes: Impact of perceived corruption on the effectiveness of non-pharmaceutical interventions at combating COVID-19.

Corruption is considered in the literature as an activity with several externalities and spillover effects. Adding to the recent research on the corruption-COVID-19 nexus, we study the impact of corruption on coronavirus cases. High perceived levels of corruption have been proven to lead to lower institutional trust, and hence possibly to lower levels of citizen compliance with non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs), such as lockdowns, imposed by the authorities during the first wave of the pandemic to reduce the spread of coronavirus. Applying quantitative analysis with the use of hybrid models, we find that in countries with higher levels of perceived corruption, across alternative corruption measures, more COVID-19 cases are observed, ceteris paribus. This suggests that corruption has a detrimental effect on the spread of COVID-19, and that countries experiencing higher levels of corruption should pay extra attention when implementing NPIs.

Health emergency and economic and territorial implications First considerations

The Covid-19 epidemic has caused a lot of economic and social damages and has generated territorial imbalances that are not yet quantifiable. Many research groups are currently committed to deepen their understanding of the impact of the crisis using different disciplinary methodologies and focusing on different aspects of the phenomenon. These researches reveal causal links between the variables involved that have not been explored up until now and raise relevant questions for the economic and social future of our Country. This paper wants to provide an overview of the territorial and economic implications related to the epidemic event on the basis of a set of economic, settlement and environmental indicators applied to the two territorial dimensions of the Italian Regions and Provinces. For each of them, the connection with primary epidemic data (number of cases and number of deaths) was analysed to verify the possible presence and consistency of the correlation indices. Aim of the article is to highlight some territorial characteristics that may have facilitated the spread of the epidemic by identifying, at the same time, some actions that will positively affect them, in an evolutionary perspective.