Lives and Livelihoods: Estimates of the Global Mortality and Poverty Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic

Publication:
Lives and Livelihoods: Estimates of the Global Mortality and Poverty Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic

dc.contributor.author	Decerf, Benoit
dc.contributor.author	Ferreira, Francisco H.G.
dc.contributor.author	Mahler, Daniel G.
dc.contributor.author	Sterck, Olivier
dc.date.accessioned	2021-06-04T18:41:42Z
dc.date.available	2021-06-04T18:41:42Z
dc.date.issued	2021-09
dc.description.abstract	We evaluate the global welfare consequences of increases in mortality and poverty generated by the Covid-19 pandemic. Increases in mortality are measured in terms of the number of years of life lost (LY) to the pandemic. Additional years spent in poverty (PY) are conservatively estimated using growth estimates for 2020 and two different scenarios for its distributional characteristics. Using years of life as a welfare metric yields a single parameter that captures the underlying trade-o between lives and livelihoods: how many PYs have the same welfare cost as one LY. Taking an agnostic view of this parameter, we compare estimates of LYs and PYs across countries for different scenarios. Three main findings arise. First, we estimate that, as of early June 2020, the pandemic (and the observed private and policy responses) had generated at least 68 million additional poverty years and 4.3 million years of life lost across 150 countries. The ratio of PYs to LYs is very large in most countries, suggesting that the poverty consequences of the crisis are of paramount importance. Second, this ratio declines systematically with GDP per capita: poverty accounts for a much greater share of the welfare costs in poorer countries. Finally, a comparison of these baseline results with mortality estimates in a counterfactual herd immunity scenario suggests that welfare losses would be greater in the latter in most countries.	en
dc.identifier.citation	World Development
dc.identifier.doi	10.1596/35680
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/10986/35680
dc.publisher	Elsevier
dc.rights	CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 IGO
dc.rights.holder	World Bank
dc.rights.uri	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo
dc.subject	COVID-19
dc.subject	CORONAVIRUS
dc.subject	WELFARE
dc.subject	POVERTY
dc.subject	MORTALITY
dc.title	Lives and Livelihoods	en
dc.title.subtitle	Estimates of the Global Mortality and Poverty Effects of the COVID-19 Pandemic	en
dc.type	Journal Article	en
dc.type	Article de journal	fr
dc.type	Artículo de revista	es
dspace.entity.type	Publication
okr.associatedcontent	https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/33938 Working paper version (pre-print)	en
okr.date.disclosure	2021-06-04
okr.date.doiregistration	2025-05-06T11:18:10.961460Z
okr.doctype	Publications & Research
okr.doctype	Publications & Research::Journal Article
okr.externalcontent	External Content
okr.identifier.report	161479
okr.language.supported	en
okr.peerreview	Academic Peer Review
okr.topic	Health, Nutrition and Population::Disease Control & Prevention
okr.topic	Poverty Reduction::Poverty and Health
okr.unit	DECPI
okr.volume	(forthcoming 2021)
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relation.isAuthorOfPublication	3360909a-fdcc-580a-9567-25d105453578
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