Assessment of Economic and Public Health Impacts in ASEAN Countries from the COVID-19 Pandemic Using TOPSIS Method

Abstract

          This paper aims 1.to assess the economic and public health impacts of ASEAN countries from the COVID–19 pandemic and 2. to propose the policies for economic and public health management in ASEAN countries. Population groups were collected as secondary data consisting of six economic indicators and five public health indicators, for a total of eleven indicators of ten ASEAN countries. Eleven indicators were defined as criteria variables and ten ASEAN countries were defined as alternative variables using the Technique for Order of Preference by Similarity to Ideal Solution (TOPSIS) analysis.

           The findings revealed that the countries with the least economic and public health impacts in ASEAN were Singapore followed by Vietnam, Brunei, Malaysia, Thailand, Indonesia and Cambodia, respectively. Meanwhile, the countries with the assessment score of the greatest economic and public health impacts in ASEAN were Philippines, Myanmar, and Laos, respectively. Interestingly, Vietnam was the second place of the least economic and public health impacts in ASEAN due to the second highest of GDP growth rate in ASEAN, the second highest of the public health budgets proportion in ASEAN and the fourth lowest of COVID–19 mortality rates in ASEAN. Thailand, meanwhile, took the fourth place in ASEAN due to the second negative economic growth rate in ASEAN and the second highest rate of COVID mortality in ASEAN.