Associations between previous local health expenditures and COVID-19 mortality outcomes large cities in the united states: results from a forward-selecting linear regression analysis.
IF 3.2 3区 医学Q2 PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH
{"title":"Associations between previous local health expenditures and COVID-19 mortality outcomes large cities in the united states: results from a forward-selecting linear regression analysis.","authors":"Matthew R Boyce, John Kraemer, Rebecca Katz","doi":"10.1186/s13690-025-01667-4","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Background: </strong>Decision-making before the COVID-19 pandemic-including the budgeting and expending of public health financing-may have impacted the ability of health systems to mitigate the health consequences of the outbreak. Theoretically, greater investments in public health preceding an outbreak ought to improve health outcomes during an emergency response. Following this reasoning, this research investigates the relationship between local public health expenditures and pandemic-related mortality in the 50 most populous cities in the United States in 2020.</p><p><strong>Methods: </strong>Forward-selecting linear regression models were used to examine this relationship. Dependent variables included local-level measures of the excess mortality and COVID-19 mortality rates; the primary independent variable was the five-year average of local public health expenditures per capita (2015-2019). Data on other demographic, socioeconomic, and pandemic response considerations that may have modified or confounded this relationship were included in regression models.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Multiple linear regression models suggested that previous local government public health expenditures were not meaningfully associated with improved pandemic mortality outcomes as measured by excess mortality or reported COVID-19 mortality. Instead, results suggest that education and temporal considerations were the factors that were significantly associated with mortality levels during the first year of the pandemic in large cities in the United States.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Acknowledging broader public health financing trends that are characterized by decreasing and unpredictable funding streams, these results suggest that addressing public health emergencies at the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States will likely require more substantial and sustained investments in public health, nuanced and data-informed approaches for allocating financing, structural changes to the public health system that address social-determinants of health, or a combination of these approaches.</p><p><strong>Trial registration: </strong>Not applicable.</p>","PeriodicalId":48578,"journal":{"name":"Archives of Public Health","volume":"83 1","pages":"179"},"PeriodicalIF":3.2000,"publicationDate":"2025-07-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC12232761/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Archives of Public Health","FirstCategoryId":"3","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1186/s13690-025-01667-4","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"医学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"PUBLIC, ENVIRONMENTAL & OCCUPATIONAL HEALTH","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Background: Decision-making before the COVID-19 pandemic-including the budgeting and expending of public health financing-may have impacted the ability of health systems to mitigate the health consequences of the outbreak. Theoretically, greater investments in public health preceding an outbreak ought to improve health outcomes during an emergency response. Following this reasoning, this research investigates the relationship between local public health expenditures and pandemic-related mortality in the 50 most populous cities in the United States in 2020.
Methods: Forward-selecting linear regression models were used to examine this relationship. Dependent variables included local-level measures of the excess mortality and COVID-19 mortality rates; the primary independent variable was the five-year average of local public health expenditures per capita (2015-2019). Data on other demographic, socioeconomic, and pandemic response considerations that may have modified or confounded this relationship were included in regression models.
Results: Multiple linear regression models suggested that previous local government public health expenditures were not meaningfully associated with improved pandemic mortality outcomes as measured by excess mortality or reported COVID-19 mortality. Instead, results suggest that education and temporal considerations were the factors that were significantly associated with mortality levels during the first year of the pandemic in large cities in the United States.
Conclusions: Acknowledging broader public health financing trends that are characterized by decreasing and unpredictable funding streams, these results suggest that addressing public health emergencies at the scale of the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States will likely require more substantial and sustained investments in public health, nuanced and data-informed approaches for allocating financing, structural changes to the public health system that address social-determinants of health, or a combination of these approaches.
期刊介绍：
rchives of Public Health is a broad scope public health journal, dedicated to publishing all sound science in the field of public health. The journal aims to better the understanding of the health of populations. The journal contributes to public health knowledge, enhances the interaction between research, policy and practice and stimulates public health monitoring and indicator development. The journal considers submissions on health outcomes and their determinants, with clear statements about the public health and policy implications. Archives of Public Health welcomes methodological papers (e.g., on study design and bias), papers on health services research, health economics, community interventions, and epidemiological studies dealing with international comparisons, the determinants of inequality in health, and the environmental, behavioural, social, demographic and occupational correlates of health and diseases.
求助内容：
应助结果提醒方式：
京公网安备 11010802042870号
