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Evaluating the Preparedness of Indian States against COVID‐19 Pandemic Risk: A Fuzzy Multi‐criteria Decision‐Making Approach
Author(s) -
Choudhury Sudipa,
Majumdar Abhijit,
Saha Apu Kumar,
Majumdar Prasenjit
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
risk analysis
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.972
H-Index - 130
eISSN - 1539-6924
pISSN - 0272-4332
DOI - 10.1111/risa.13808
Subject(s) - preparedness , tamil , pandemic , covid-19 , analytic hierarchy process , geography , socioeconomics , environmental health , operations research , medicine , political science , engineering , sociology , law , philosophy , linguistics , disease , pathology , infectious disease (medical specialty)
The preparedness of Indian states and union territories (UTs) against the COVID‐19 pandemic has been evaluated. Ten parameters related to demographic, socioeconomic, and healthcare aspects have been considered and the performances of 27 states and three UTs have been evaluated applying the Fuzzy Analytic Hierarchy Process. Opinions of medical experts have been considered to ascertain the relative importance of decision criteria as well as subcriteria. The scores of various states and UTs in each of the decision subcriteria have been calculated by using the secondary data collected from authentic sources. It is found that Kerala and Bihar are the best prepared and worst prepared states, respectively, to combat COVID‐19 pandemic. Karnataka, Goa, and Tamil Nadu have very good preparedness whereas Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, and Bihar have very poor preparedness. Maharashtra, the most affected state in India, has average preparedness. As around 650 million people are vulnerable due to the poor and very poor preparedness of their states, the country needs to make region specific mitigation strategies to combat the COVID‐19 pandemic and the preparedness map will be helpful in that direction.