UAE is most pandemic-resilient country in the world, say global reports

Two global surveys have placed UAE on top of the list when it comes to pandemic resilience.

A Staff Reporter

Published: Fri 28 Jan 2022, 7:04 PM

Last updated: Fri 28 Jan 2022, 10:25 PM

The UAE once again has been placed at the top of the Bloomberg pandemic resilience ranking that measures the resilience and response of the world’s biggest 53 economies to the Covid- 19 pandemic.

In November 2021, the company noted that the UAE outperformed Europe in terms of containing the pandemic, naming it as the best place to be with the emergence of the Omicron variant. “Ruling out a return to full lockdown, the UAE economy is poised for strong economic growth this year helped by the rebound in oil prices,” read the most recent report.

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Similarly, the UAE was also ranked first globally for its Covid-19 response and resilience, according to the Pandemic Resilience Index 2022.

Published by a United States-based advocacy group Consumer Choice Centre, the UAE was closely followed by Cyprus, Bahrain and Israel in the index.

The Pandemic Resilience Index ranks 40 countries regarding their health system’s resilience to the COVID-19 and similar crises.

Originally published in April 2021, the Index looks at the following factors: vaccination approval, its drive, and time lags that have put brakes on it, critical care bed capacity, and mass testing.

Mass testing initiatives, the national vaccination drive, the booster shot distribution programme, and critical care bed capacity were among the key factors considered in the Consumer Choice Centre index.

“The UAE was the pioneer of the booster rollout. Countries such as New Zealand, Ukraine, Australia, Spain and Canada took 5 months longer to get it up and running,” said Maria Chaplia, research manager at the Consumer Choice Centre.

Meanwhile, the Bloomberg report draws on 12 data indicators spanning virus containment, quality of healthcare, vaccination coverage, overall mortality and progress toward restarting travel.

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The report read, “As of October 2021’s Ranking, which marked a full year of the project, only seven countries had never fallen into the bottom half even as the pandemic shape-shifted.”

It added, “The UAE, Finland, Canada, Denmark, South Korea, Norway and Switzerland were the pandemic’s equivalent of season MVPs: whether in containing the virus’s spread, rolling out vaccination, withstanding variants or reopening their economies, they consistently scored above average.”

reporters@khaleejtimes.com