Page 83 - GHES-1-2

Global Health Econ Sustain Imports of essential medical products

Table 4. Model estimation results
Pooled Random Random effects Fixed effects Random Pooled OLS Pooled OLS
OLS effects effects
Test kits Disinfectants Medical Medical Oxygen Protective Medical vehicles
consumables devices therapy garments and furniture
Ln (GDPpc) 1.380*** 0.921*** 0.605*** 1.034*** 0.832*** 0.771*** 0.884***
Ln (Pop 65) 1.039*** 1.081*** 0.802*** 1.478*** 1.229*** 0.923*** 0.855***
Ln (Beds) 0.502 −0.037 0.311 1.163*** 0.382 0.544*** 0.646***
HICP 0.010 −0.033** −0.006 −0.005 0.025* 0.026 0.015
DExtra −1.703*** −1.756*** −1.735*** Omitted −1.489*** −0.509*** −0.822***
D2020 0.082 0.400*** 0.116*** 1.110*** 0.063 0.371*** 0.117
Cons −21.56*** −10.59*** −5.69*** −20.53*** −18.76*** −11.32*** −13.76***
Obs 324 324 324 324 324 324 324
Adj R 2 0.857 0.744 0.795 0.805 0.822 0.826 0.857
Breusch-Pagan test
Chi (1) 0.87 24.24 57.94 11.47 9.36 0.36 0.01
2
Prob>Chi 2 0.351 0.000 0.000 0.000 0.002 0.547 0.910
Hausman test
Chi (4) -- 2.60 2.05 16.15 5.23 -- --
2
Prob>Chi 2 -- 0.461 0.725 0.006 0.264 -- --
Notes: (1) Dependent variable: ln imports; (2) ***, ** and * denote significance at the 1%, 5%, and 10% levels, respectively; (4) Degrees of freedom of
the statistic.

However, the number of beds, which represents an four of the seven products (disinfectants, medical consumables,
important element of hospital infrastructure, is only medical devices, and protective garments), confirming the
significantly related to the import of vehicles and furniture, major role they play in the fight against the virus. This is
medical devices, and protective garments. The number of reflected by an increase in imports of these products in the first
beds reflects the hospital capacity and is therefore related 10 months of 2020 compared to previous years.
to the essential equipment for hospitals, which is supplied
in accordance with their needs. 5. Conclusion
It has also been shown that price changes, as indicated The economic crisis generated by the measures taken to curb
by HICP, have only a weakly significant influence on the the pandemic has led to major distortions in international
import of medical products (disinfectant and oxygen trade. Some studies have focused on analyzing important
therapy equipment). This is due to the fact that they are changes in trade policy aimed at mitigating the negative
essential goods and not very sensitive to price changes. effects of COVID-19, following the imposition of export
They are thus considered very inelastic products. On the restrictions and the liberalization of imports. The empirical
other hand, the existence of barriers to trade means that the analysis of this research provides relevant information on
volume of import from EU member states exceeds those the behavior of the determinants of imports of essential
from the rest of the world; this is reflected by the negative medical products, as defined by the WHO, within the EU
sign of the dummy Dextra in the estimations for all the during the period 2015 – 2020.
medical goods. In this respect, Makrevska et al. (2020) In a context in which volume of intra-EU trade generally
also confirmed the preference for European products in exceeds that of extra-EU trade, a panel sample of 27 EU
a global context. EU countries enjoy trade privileges that countries is used to shed light on the variables that explain
foster internal trade and make it harder to purchase from the similarities and differences among different types of
countries outside the European agreement. The latter are imported medical products. The wealth of the importing
penalized not only in terms of tariffs but also in the extra country and the population aged over 65 could explain the
bureaucracy that complicates and slows down transactions. volume of import: the greater the purchasing power and
Finally, the dummy D2020 introduced to capture the effect the older the population, the higher the volume of imports.
of COVID-19 turned out to be positive and significant for only However, the number of beds only influences the import

Volume 1 Issue 2 (2023) 9 https://doi.org/10.36922/ghes.1207