Turkey ranks 74th out of 98 countries in COVID Performance Index

Duvar English 

Turkey has ranked 74th out of 98 countries in Lowy Institute's COVID Performance Index, which examined how well or poorly countries managed the pandemic. 

While Brazil ranked last with 4.3 points, New Zealand was the most successful country in managing the pandemic with 94.4 points. Turkey was in 74th place with 34.3 points. 

The index, which explored how 98 countries with publicly available and comparable data on the virus have managed the pandemic to date following their hundredth confirmed case of COVID-19, used six indicators, including confirmed cases, confirmed deaths, confirmed cases per million people, confirmed deaths per million people, confirmed cases as a proportion of tests and tests per thousand people. 

The said indicators point to how well or poorly countries have managed the pandemic in the 36 weeks that followed their hundredth confirmed case, according to the Lowy Institute. 

In terms of political systems, the index showed that countries with authoritarian models had no prolonged advantage in suppressing the virus. Democracies found marginally more success than other forms of government in their handling of the pandemic over the examined period. 

Smaller countries (with populations of fewer than 10 million people) proved more agile than the majority of their larger counterparts in handling the health emergency for most of 2020.

In general, countries with smaller populations, cohesive societies, and capable institutions have a comparative advantage in dealing with a global crisis such as a pandemic. Systemic factors alone — a society’s regional provenance, political system, economic development, or size — cannot account fully for the differences observed in global crisis responses.