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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the trend of life expectancy in Bangladesh and find the effect of eliminating the causes of diseases on life expectancy statistics.

Data consisted of 1,530 deaths in 2000, 1,582 deaths in 2004 and 1,514 deaths in 2008 that were collected from the Health and Demographic Surveillance System of International Centre for Diarrheal Disease Research, Bangladesh. Trends in life expectancy after eliminating the cause of diseases were examined by a Single Decrement Life table.

The expectation of life for both male and female presented differing patterns. Results showed that life expectancies were greatly reduced in the presence of all groups of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) in the community, whilst life expectancies were significantly improved if all NCDs within all disease groups were completely eliminated. The life expectancies in the presence of NCDs showed lowest expected years among all the present diseases groups and the life expectancies eliminating NCDs showed highest expected years among all the eliminating diseases groups. The results indicated that 10.99 years of life would be added to life expectancy at birth for the male population and 8.82 years for the female population in 2008 if NCDs were eliminated.

The findings of this study provide useful information which could contribute to a more effective allocation of targeted funding for developing public health programs. Lowering mortality by eliminating major groups of diseases results in higher life expectancy ratings. Specifically, the relative impacts of eliminating cardiovascular diseases and respiratory diseases, as compared with eliminating neoplasms.

Background: This study aimed to appraise the monetary value of human life losses associated with COVID-19 in Turkey. To our knowledge, it is the first study in Turkey to value human life losses associated with COVID-19.

Methods: A human capital approach (HCA) model was applied to estimate the total monetary value of the 4,807 human lives lost in Turkey (TMVHL) from COVID-19 by 15 June 2020. The TMVHL equals the sum of monetary values of human lives lost (MVHL) across nine age groups. The MVHL accruing to each age group is the sum of the product of discount factor, years of life lost, net GDP per capita, and the number of COVID-19 deaths in an age group. The HCA model was re-calculated five times assuming discount rates of 3%, 5%, and 10% with a national life expectancy of 78.45 years; and the world highest life expectancy of 87.1 years and global life expectancy of 72 years with 3% discount rate.

Results: The 4807 human life losses from COVID-19 had a TMVHL of Int$1,098,469,122; and a mean of Int$228,514 per human life. Reanalysis with 5% and 10% discount rates, holding national life expectancy constant, reduced the TMVHL by Int$167,248,319 (15.2%) and Int$ 429,887,379 (39%), respectively. Application of the global life expectancy reduced the TMVHL by 36.4%, and use of world highest life expectancy increased TMVHL by 69%. However, the HCA captures only the economic production losses incurred as a result of years of life lost. It ignores non-market contributions to social welfare and the adverse effects of economic activities.

Conclusions: Additional investment is needed to bridge the persisting gaps in international health regulations capacities, universal health coverage, and safely managed water and sanitation services.

This paper aims to evaluate the technical efficiency of the health-care systems in 21 selected middle-income countries during the period (2000–2017) and determine the source of inefficiency whether it is transient (short run) or persistent (long run).

The study uses the stochastic frontier analysis technique through employing the generalized true random effects model which overcomes the drawbacks of the previously introduced stochastic frontier models and allows for the separation between unobserved heterogeneity, persistent inefficiency and transient inefficiency.

Persistent efficiency is lower than the transient efficiency; hence, there are more efficiency gains that can be made by the selected countries by adopting long-term policies that aim at reforming the structure of the health-care system in the less efficient countries such as South Africa and Russia. The most efficient countries are Vietnam, Mexico and China which adopted a social health insurance that covers almost the whole population with the aim of increasing access to health-care services. Also, decentralization in health-care has assisted in adopting health-care policies that are suitable for both the rural and urban areas based on their specific conditions and health-care needs. A key success in the implementation of the adopted long-term policies by those countries is the continuous monitoring and evaluation of their outcomes and comparing them with the predefined targets and conducting any necessary modifications to ensure their movement in the right path to achieve their goals.

Although several studies have evaluated the technical efficiency both across and within countries using non-parametric (data envelopment analysis) and parametric (stochastic frontier analysis) approaches, to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first attempt to evaluate the technical efficiency of selected middle-income countries during the period (2000–2017) using the generalized true random effects stochastic frontier analysis model.

To estimate the discounted money value of human lives lost (DMVHL) due to COVID-19 in Spain.

The study employs the human capital approach to estimate the DMVHL (assuming Spain's life expectancy of 83 years and a 3% discount rate) of the 20,453 human lives lost in Spain from COVID-19 as of 19 April 2020. Sensitivity analysis was conducted alternately assuming (a) 5% and 10% discount rate; and (b) global life expectancy of 72 years, and the world's highest life expectancy of 87.1 years.

The 20,453 human lives lost due to COVID-19 had a total DMVHL of Int$ 9,629,234,112, and an average of Int$ 470,798 per human life lost. Alternate re-estimation of the economic model with a 5% and 10% discount rates led to 19.8% and 47.4% reductions in the DMVHL, respectively. Re-calculation of the economic model using the global life expectancy of 72 years, while holding the discount rate constant at 3%, diminished the DMVHL by 41%. While the re-run of the same model using the world's highest life expectancy of 87.1 years instead, it increased the DMVHL by 18%.

The study omits the value of health systems inputs used in preventing, diagnosing and treating COVID-19 cases; and the negative impact of COVID-19 on the agriculture, education, finance, manufacturing, travel, tourism, and trade sectors.

There is a need to use this kind of evidence to advocate for increased investments into the strengthening of the national health system, IHR capacities, and coverage of safe water and sanitation facilities.

In Spain, no other study had attempted to estimate the net present value of human lives lost from COVID-19.

Some progress have been made over time in improving health conditions in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). There are, however, contradicting reports on the relationship between health outcomes and economic growth in the region. The paper aimed at assessing the effect of health outcome on economic growth in SSA.

Data for 41 countries from 2000 to 2018 were obtained from WDI and WGI and analyzed using system generalized method of moment (sGMM) which is appropriate for the present scenario. AR(1) and AR(2) tests were used to assess the validity of the model while Sargan and Hansen tests were adopted to examine the validity of the instrumental variables. The robustness of the estimation was confirmed using the pooled OLS and fixed effect regression.

Health outcome (proxied by life expectancy), lagged GDP per capita, capital formation, labor force (LF), health expenditure (HE), foreign direct investment (FDI) and trade openness (TOP) significantly affected economic growth emphasizing the importance of health in the process of economic growth in the region. AR(1) and AR(2) tests for serial correlation and Sargan/Hansen tests confirmed the validity of the estimated model and the instrumental variables respectively. Robustness of the GMM results was established from the pooled OLS and the fixed effect model results.

Improvement in the national health system possibly through the widespread adoption of National Health Insurance, increase government spending on healthcare alongside increased beneficial trade and ease of doing business to facilitate investment were recommended to enhance.

The study used up-to-date data with appropriate methodology.

The purpose of this paper is to study the factors affecting COVID-19 mortality.

An empirical model is developed in which the mortality rate per million is the dependent variable, and life expectancy at birth, physician density, education, obesity, proportion of population over the age of 65, urbanization (population density) and per capita income are explanatory variables. Crosscountry data from 184 countries are used to estimate the quantile regression that is employed.

The estimated results suggest that obesity, the proportion of the population over the age of 65 and urbanization have a positive and statistically significant effect on COVID-19 mortality. Not surprisingly, per capita income has a negative and statistically significant effect on COVID-19 death rate.

The study is based on the COVID-19 mortality data from June 2020, which have constantly being changed. What data reveal today may be different after two or three months. Despite this limitation, it is expected that this study will serve as the basis for future research in this area.

Since the findings suggest that obesity, population over the age of 65 and density are the primary factors affecting COVID-19 death, the policy-makers should pay particular attention to these factors.

To the authors’ knowledge, this is first attempt to estimate the factors affecting the COVID-19 mortality rate. Its novelty also lies in the use of quantile regressions, which is more efficient in estimating empirical models with heterogeneous data.

While the Olympic Games are always under the spotlight, the Paralympic Games are somehow ignored. This paper aims to invite the general public to think about the para-athletes and the differential treatments they received.

Among the participating countries, many of them were unable to win a single Olympic or Paralympic medal. When the dependent variable is left-censored, ordinary least squares regression is asymptotically biased downwards. In the literature, researchers typically employ the maximum likelihood Tobit model to take care of the censoring problem. However, some researchers argue that the Hurdle model has an advantage over the Tobit model in identifying the determinants of winning Olympic medals. Following their wisdom, this paper employs both the Tobit and Hurdle models in analysis.

The empirical evidence gathered in this paper suggests that population size, host status and average years of schooling are the big three socio-economic determinants when it comes to winning medals at the Paralympic Games and Olympic Games. The findings support the hypothesis that sports talent is randomly distributed and a large country has a higher chance to have talented athletes or para-athletes winning the Olympic medals. The strong host advantage also showed up in the following Paralympics but was not so strong at the next Olympics.

This paper not only examines the relationship between various social, economic and political factors in determining the success of a nation in the Paralympic Games but also attempts to identify possible non-traditional determinants.

This study aims at evaluating the technical efficiency (TE) of healthcare systems in the Arab region and exploring the key factors that affect the efficiency performance.

The study applies a two-stage Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) approach to a sample of 20 Arab countries. In the first stage, a DEA model is used to calculate the TE scores of the examined healthcare systems in 2019 and 2010, following both the output and input orientations of efficiency. In the second stage, a censored Tobit model is estimated to investigate the determinants of healthcare efficiency.

DEA results of 2019 indicate that achievable efficiency gains of the Arab countries range from 0.4% to 16% under the output and input orientations, respectively. Six countries are efficient under both orientations. Although the average efficiency scores of the Arab countries have deteriorated between 2010 and 2019, Djibouti and Sudan had the greatest efficiency improvements between the two years. Bahrain, Mauritania, Morocco and Qatar proved to be efficient in 2010 and 2019 under the two orientations of efficiency and according to the two DEA specifications followed. The Tobit model reveals that corruption and government health expenditure tend to have an adverse impact on healthcare efficiency.

The author evaluates healthcare efficiency and healthcare's efficiency determinants in the Arab countries. Regardless Arab countries' diversity, these countries are facing common health challenges, including diminishing role of governments in healthcare financing; increased out-of-pocket healthcare spending; poor healthcare outputs and prevalence of health inequities resulting from weak governance institutions. Comparing the efficiency of healthcare systems between 2010 and 2019 gives insights on the potential impact of the Arab spring uprisings on healthcare efficiency. Moreover, examining the determinants of healthcare efficiency allows for better understanding of how to improve the efficiency of healthcare systems in the region.

The economic shock posed by the current COVID-19 outbreak brought out a worldwide public health emergency with a close relationship between the industrial marketing practices, the health level of society and its economic development. The purpose of this study is to analyse the industrial dynamics in health care and their impact on economic growth and health status.

To empirically investigate the relationship between growth and health, the authors use a data set drawn from 29 selected Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries over the period 2000 and 2019. Using panel regressions, the authors investigate the impact of the health-care industry measured in terms of health status, health expenditure, sales on pharmaceutical products, the number of persons working in health care and the coverage by private health insurances. Fixed effect and random effect regressions are used to estimate this model.

Overall, the results are suggestive of a nexus between the industrial marketing dynamics of health-care context and economic growth – both interacting and improving each other. As the quality of the health-care market enhances, the economy grows richer and the health status of the population improves considerably.

To support health-care markets in OECD countries, health policymakers need to formulate a long-term industrial health policy that addresses all the social and individual determinants of health.

To the best of the knowledge, this is the first study to provide a better understanding of the relationship between health-care industrial dynamics and economic growth in OECD countries along different dimensions.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the relationship between fiscal policy (tax revenues and government expenditure) and economic happiness. The panel data are used from 2012 to 2016 for 18 countries of the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region.

The study adopted the Barro (1990) model of endogeneity growth to characterize the relationship between fiscal policy and economic happiness. The study estimated the model by using the pooled ordinary least squares method, the fixed effects method and the random-effects method. In addition, the study used the dynamic estimate of this relationship rather than the conventional static estimate through the generalized method of moments’ method. This leads to overcoming the endogeneity problem between the dependent variable and the independent variables.

The main findings indicated that there is a negative and statistically significant relationship between nondistortionary taxes and economic happiness. Also, there is no relationship between public expenditure and economic happiness, whether productive or nonproductive. The results confirmed a positive and significant relationship between other revenues and economic happiness. The current study recommended the diversification of other public revenue sources to increase its contribution to public expenditure financing and the restructuring of the tax system, particularly nondistortionary taxes. These taxes must be replaced by other revenues or by distortionary taxes to increase economic happiness.

The research represents a strong starting base that can help researchers to conduct more studies on economic happiness by using different measures and comparing their results to find out the determinants of happiness. The relationship between economic happiness and fiscal policy with its different aspects requires more studies, especially the relationship between taxes and economic happiness in our region. The study of the relationship between public expenditure and economic happiness according to economic activities can guide decision-makers to direct the expenditure toward economic activities that achieve the happiness of their citizens. Enriching this study requires the availability of fiscal data for the entire MENA region for longer periods, which allow us to divide the countries of the region into petroleum and nonpetroleum countries, but the scarcity of data is one of the limitations of the study.

The governments of MENA countries should diversify other public revenue sources to increase the financing public expenditure by the expense of tax revenues, especially nondistortionary taxes, which would increase the economic happiness of their citizens.

This study is one of the rare studies that investigate the relationship between fiscal policy and economic happiness at the global level. This study contributed to filling the gap of this issue in the MENA region and enriching global literature through the experience of the MENA region. Moreover, this study investigated all aspects of fiscal policy, in contrast to other studies that focused on one of its aspects. The weakness in these studies is because of the lack of correlation between the sources of revenues and the face of their spending.