Defining an ‘Epidemiological Risk Index’ to analyse COVID-19 mortality across European regions

Abstract The spread and severity of COVID-19 within the European regions have been highly heterogeneous, with significant differences in both the number of infected persons and mortality across regions. This paper improves the weak ability of welfare variables, such as the HDI, to explain COVID-19 mortality. We propose a novel ‘Epidemiological Risk Index’, including environmental quality, global interaction, health system infrastructure, and population characteristics, which provides a better explanation of pandemic mortality in European regions. We deal with spatial interdependence in COVID-19 mortality by using spatial lagged covariates and Geographical Weighted Regressions. The findings in this study call attention to the influence of epidemiological factors in addition to purely development factors in explaining the severity of COVID-19.