A man wearing a face mask walks on a street in Manhattan of New York, the United States, Jan. 19, 2022. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)
For every 100 deaths, an additional 8.2 deaths from the novel coronavirus were recorded in non-populist countries, on average, compared to 17.6 more deaths in populist-led countries, the U.S. business magazine Forbes has reported.
NEW YORK, Jan. 28 (Xinhua) -- Populist countries like the United States have recorded an average rate of excess COVID-19 deaths twice as high as countries with non-populist governments in 2020, the U.S. business magazine Forbes has reported.
Citing a peer-reviewed study published in the Journal of Political Institutions and Political Economy in November, excess deaths -- or the fatalities beyond those expected without the COVID-19 pandemic -- were 8 percent higher in populist countries, said the report published Thursday.
Medical workers wheel a patient into Maimonides Medical Center in the Brooklyn borough of New York, the United States, Dec. 14, 2021. (Photo by Michael Nagle/Xinhua)
For every 100 deaths, an additional 8.2 deaths from the novel coronavirus were recorded in non-populist countries, on average, compared to 17.6 more deaths in populist-led countries, the reported added.
The study's authors also argued that populist governments were less likely to implement long-term pandemic policies and more likely to communicate messaging that downplayed the severity of the pandemic and discredited science, which made people less likely to restrict their movements of their own accord, said the Forbes report.
"The numbers are clear -- populists are the worst crisis managers in the COVID-19 pandemic and responsible for many avoidable deaths in the countries they govern," Michael Bayerlein, a researcher on populism at the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, said in a statement Thursday. ■
