The role of European health system characteristics in affecting Covid 19 lethality during the early days of the pandemic.
Sci Rep
; 11(1): 23739, 2021 12 09.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1565735
ABSTRACT
This article examines the main factors affecting COVID-19 lethality across 16 European Countries with a focus on the role of health system characteristics during the first phase of the diffusion of the virus. Specifically, we investigate the leading causes of lethality at 10, 20, 30, 40 days in the first hit of the pandemic. Using a random forest regression (ML), with lethality as outcome variable, we show that the percentage of people older than 65 years (with two or more chronic diseases) is the main predictor variable of lethality by COVID-19, followed by the number of hospital intensive care unit beds, investments in healthcare spending compared to GDP, number of nurses and doctors. Moreover, the variable of general practitioners has little but significant predicting quality. These findings contribute to provide evidence for the prediction of lethality caused by COVID-19 in Europe and open the discussion on health policy and management of health care and ICU beds during a severe epidemic.
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Community Health Planning
/
COVID-19
/
Health Facilities
/
Health Services Accessibility
/
Health Systems Plans
Type of study:
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Randomized controlled trials
Limits:
Humans
Country/Region as subject:
Europa
Language:
English
Journal:
Sci Rep
Year:
2021
Document Type:
Article
Affiliation country:
S41598-021-03120-2
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