THE Philippines again got the lowest ranking in an international business magazine’s list of the world’s safest countries.
The Philippines, with a safety index score of 14.8899, ranked 134th among 134 countries included in the Global Finance’s list of safest countries for 2021. The country was also at the bottom of the 2019 list of 128 countries.
The magazine lumped the Philippines together with other countries with serious civil conflict that have high risks from natural disasters such as Nigeria, Yemen and El Salvador.
These countries “all reported relatively low death tolls from Covid-19, yet performed poorly in terms of safety overall,” the magazine stated.
The Philippines ranked lower than El Salvador (124th), which has the highest murder rate in Latin America, and Yemen (126th), where a civil war continues to rage.
The magazine considered three fundamental factors, namely, war and peace, personal security, and natural disaster risk as well as the “unique risk factors” brought about by the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) pandemic.
The Covid-19 scores were derived from data as of May 30, 2021, weighing deaths per capita from the disease twice as heavily as the other factors.
Vaccinations per capita were taken as a countervailing or positive factor into account, weighing it equally as the other fundamentals.
The magazine pointed out that deaths per capita is a direct measure of how well or poorly a country responded to the spread of Covid-19, which in turn is based on the country’s healthcare infrastructure, government capabilities, political leadership and culture in face of a major, unexpected crisis.
Vaccinations per capita, on the other hand, reflects a country’s financial power and future performance during outbreaks.
The magazine said many European countries that performed well in past rankings such as Portugal, Spain, Slovenia and Belgium did not land in the top 20 this year because their governments handled the Covid-19 crisis poorly.
The magazine, however, cautioned that the rankings and scores “should be taken with a grain of salt.”
“While the fundamental factors rely on concise reports produced by NGOs (non-government organizations) and international organizations, the Covid-19 death tolls and the vaccination rates are largely based on self-reporting by governments,” it said.
Some governments may not be producing credible figures while others may not be capable of gathering necessary data, it added. (Third Anne Peralta-Malonzo / SunStar Philippines)