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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Clim.

Sec. Climate and Health

Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fclim.2025.1504804

Pandemics and Environmental Performance in a Globalized World

Provisionally accepted
Inma Martínez-Zarzoso Inma Martínez-Zarzoso 1,2*Cristina Badarau Cristina Badarau 3Luis Díaz Pavez Luis Díaz Pavez 1Juan Armando Torres Munguía Juan Armando Torres Munguía 1Konstantin Wacker Konstantin Wacker 4
  • 1 University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany
  • 2 University of Jaume I, Castelló de La Plana, Valencian Community, Spain
  • 3 Université de Bordeaux, Bordeaux, Aquitaine, France
  • 4 University of Groningen, Groningen, Netherlands

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Purpose: This paper aims at understanding the factors that are associated with disease outbreaks by investigating environmental and globalization risk factors. Design/methodology/approach: As environmental factors we consider several dimensions of the Environmental Performance Index (EPI). To gauge globalization, we consider international trade flows and international flights, as well as two globalization indices accounting for economic and interpersonal globalization. Methodologically, we estimate a Poisson Random Effects model for panel data covering 195 countries over 25 years. Findings: First, concerning the EPI dimensions, we find that improving sanitation and drinking water conditions are negatively and significantly correlated with the frequency of the outbreaks, whereas no robust relationship could be identified for changes in biodiversity habitat, ecosystem services, and waste management. Second, regarding the globalization factors, we find that an increase in imports and in the number of international flights are positively correlated with the number of outbreaks. Conversely, neither of the two globalization indices considered have a clear association with outbreaks. Originality: The paper uses a new dataset of infectious disease outbreaks collected from the Disease Outbreak News produced by the World Health Organization containing information on 1462 events occurred between 1996 and 2019, covering 195 countries and 70 diseases.Practical implications: In view of the results, local policy efforts in low-income countries should aim at improving sanitary conditions. This effort could be leveraged with development aid support. Once outbreaks have been detected in a location, international flight restrictions should be considered to reduce the international contagion rate. The main contribution of this paper is to provide empirical evidence for policymakers that can be used to minimize the probability of future pandemics.

    Keywords: COVID-19, Epidemics, Pandemics, Outbreaks, Sanitation, Water, Biodiversity, Globalization JEL: F10

    Received: 21 Nov 2024; Accepted: 10 Mar 2025.

    Copyright: © 2025 Martínez-Zarzoso, Badarau, Díaz Pavez, Torres Munguía and Wacker. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Inma Martínez-Zarzoso, University of Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

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