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The Economics of Emerging Infections in the Asia-Pacific Region: What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know?

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Plagues and Politics

Part of the book series: Global Issues Series ((GLOISS))

Abstract

Recently, the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) joined a number of other trading cooperations and communities in making the issue of emerging infectious diseases a priority. Although there is a perception that epidemics are costly, description or quantification of these costs has not been systematic. We reviewed published and unpublished information about the costs of epidemic disease activity in the 19 Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation economies and other regional economies to establish the economic costs over the past ten years. Our own study did not include a number of direct or human costs related to the occurrence of major infectious diseases. These costs include treatment costs and lost income as well as other costs related to social changes brought about by the onset of an infectious disease. Rather, we focused on loss in revenues and costs of regulation and trade and travel dislocation to economies. Our findings are: (1) measurement of economic impact of infectious diseases has been haphazard, and information is therefore uneven; (2) due to the sparcity of information, it proved impossible to quantify a total cost figure for the APEC economies due to epidemic activity impact on trade and travel; (3) a case study approach allows the most useful consideration of such activity; (4) describing risk factors for economic loss may prove useful; (5) more systematic prospective monitoring would be useful to quantify the impact of epidemic activity.

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Authors
  1. Robert Davis
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  2. Ann Marie Kimball
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Political Science and Public Administration, University of North Dakota, USA

    Andrew T. Price-Smith (Assistant Professor, Director of the Program on Environment, Health and Human Security) (Assistant Professor, Director of the Program on Environment, Health and Human Security)

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© 2001 Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited

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Davis, R., Kimball, A.M. (2001). The Economics of Emerging Infections in the Asia-Pacific Region: What Do We Know and What Do We Need to Know?. In: Price-Smith, A.T. (eds) Plagues and Politics. Global Issues Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230524248_4

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