Economic development, life expectancy and public health expenditure in Mexico. Exploring the impact of COVID-19

Abstract

The objective of this research, taking into consideration life expectative (LE) as an indicator of economic development, is analyzing, through econometric methods, a production function that explains the variations in the LE primarily due to health public expenditure, whether as directed by social security institutions or under different health programs. The analysis is extended to exploring several explanations of the differences in LE due to COVID at the national level and by clusters of states according to their human development indexes. Results show the crucial role of the health public expenditurein avoiding a more significant fall in the LE in those states classified in the medium and lower levels of human development.