Loading...
Please wait, while we are loading the content...
Similar Documents
Forest Area, $CO_{2}$ Emission, and COVID-19 Case-Fatality Rate: A Worldwide Ecological Study Using Spatial Regression Analysis
| Content Provider | MDPI |
|---|---|
| Author | Li, Hansen Zhang, Guodong Cao, Yang |
| Copyright Year | 2022 |
| Description | Spatial analysis is essential to understand the spreading of the COVID-19 pandemic. Due to numerous factors of multi-disciplines involved, the current pandemic is yet fully known. Hence, the current study aimed to expand the knowledge on the pandemic by exploring the roles of forests and $CO_{2}$ emission in the COVID-19 case-fatality rate (CFR) at the global level. Data were captured on the forest coverage rate and $CO_{2}$ emission per capita from 237 countries. Meanwhile, extra demographic and socioeconomic variables were also included to adjust for potential confounding. Associations between the forest coverage rate and $CO_{2}$ emission per capita and the COVID-19 CFR were assessed using spatial regression analysis, and the results were further stratified by country income levels. Although no distinct association between the COVID-19 CFR and forest coverage rate or $CO_{2}$ emission per capita was found worldwide, we found that a 10% increase in forest coverage rates was associated with a 2.37‰ (95%CI: 3.12, 1.62) decrease in COVID-19 CFRs in low-income countries; and a 10% increase in $CO_{2}$ emission per capita was associated with a 0.94‰ (95%CI: 1.46, 0.42) decrease in COVID-19 CFRs in low-middle-income countries. Since a strong correlation was observed between the $CO_{2}$ emission per capita and GDP per capita (r = 0.89), we replaced $CO_{2}$ emission with GDP and obtained similar results. Our findings suggest a higher forest coverage may be a protective factor in low-income countries, which may be related to their low urbanization levels and high forest accessibilities. On the other hand, $CO_{2}$ can be a surrogate of GDP, which may be a critical factor likely to decrease the COVID-19 CFR in lower-middle-income countries. |
| Starting Page | 736 |
| e-ISSN | 19994907 |
| DOI | 10.3390/f13050736 |
| Journal | Forests |
| Issue Number | 5 |
| Volume Number | 13 |
| Language | English |
| Publisher | MDPI |
| Publisher Date | 2022-05-09 |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Subject Keyword | Forests Remote Sensing Covid-19 Forest Co2 Fatality Death Mortality Health Nature |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
