A Two Covid-19 Years Quartile Comparison of Official with Excess Mortality : Voice and Accountability and the Impact of Vaccines

We evaluate the quartile ranking of countries during the Covid-19 pandemic using both official (i.e., confirmed) and excess mortality data. Contrasting countries' rankings using these two data sources reveal sharp and systematic differences. While higher GDP per capita is associated with a worse mortality ranking when using official Covid-19 mortality, there is no such sharp association when using excess mortality data. By the end of 2021, the quartile rankings of three-fifths of the countries in our sample differ when ranked by excess vs. official mortality. On average, countries that are 'doing substantially better' in the excess mortality dataset are characterized by lower population density; higher GDP/Capita; and higher scores on institutional and policy variables. To characterize these differences, we perform two sets of regressions, in which the ratio of Cumulative Excess to Official Covid-19 mortalities (E/O ratio) is regressed on a large set of covariates. Our sample composes over 140 countries, and the analysis is run both at the end of 2020 and the end of 2021. In the first, narrow experiment, we only control for GDP/Capita and vaccination rates. In the second, broad experiment, we add other institutional and policy variables. In the narrow experiment, by December 2021 the E/O ratio was smaller in countries with higher vaccination rates. In the broad experiment, the E/O ratio was smaller in countries with higher degree of voice and accountability. Our results suggest that the arrival of vaccines in early 2021 and voice and accountability had a discernible association with the gap between excess and official mortality