კონფერენცია

∘ Avtandil Sulaberidze ∘ Vladimer Sulaberidze ∘ Vano Shushtakashvili ∘
DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS OF A PANDEMIC AND SELF-CARING BEHAVIOR

Summary

The recent pandemic COVID-19 has caused serious political, social, economic, demographic and other types of problems besides population’s health issues. It is difficult to fight the mentioned problem as there are uncertainties concerning the origin and development of the pandemic, as well as the fact that we do not yet possess a vaccine and medication against the virus, etc.

The pandemic is directly linked with demographic factors and millions of demographic losses. The gravity of COVID-19 depends not only on the condition of a country’s health system and future measures of policy, but also on the demographic factors. In particular, it relies on the age structure of population, regional movement, migration, social behavior, the degree of self-care of individuals, families and society at large, etc. These are the basic factors that determine how grave the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic will be in the world and in separate countries.

In accordance with the World Health Organization’s conclusion, the risk of children’s infection must be higher in developing and poor countries than in developed ones. The contrary is true among the elderly of the developed countries. From this standpoint, according to the data of Table 1, in the region of Caucasus, Georgia and Armenia have higher risks of hypothetical population infection than does Azerbaijan in terms of the same age indicators (among them persons aged above 80). However, since the emergence of the COVID-19, in other words, during four months, the quantity of the infected and deceased was much less in Georgia compared to the above-mentioned two neighboring countries. We see the analogous situation when we compare Georgia with the other countries of the world.

One of the elements of social security (in terms of health) is self-caring behavior of an individual or a society toward health, which is a form of relationship between the individuals (care and self-care) and is characterized by activities of various levels.

Nowadays, under the circumstances of the pandemic, the attitude of self-caring behavior belongs to the social level, inasmuch as social demands, motivation of overcoming the pandemic as well as imagining the acceptable behavior in order to make an appropriate decision, come to the forefront.

Thus, people and societies can, as a result of their self-caring behavior, avoid becoming infected during a pandemic and decrease the level of diseases and mortality. In this regard, citizens have to take heed of and fulfil the recommendations of government and Word Health Organization.

Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University Paata Gugushvili Institute of Economics International Scientific C O N F E R E N C E S "ECONOMY – XXI CENTURY"

E ISSN 2587 - 4691	∘ Avtandil Sulaberidze ∘ Vladimer Sulaberidze ∘ Vano Shushtakashvili ∘ DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS OF A PANDEMIC AND SELF-CARING BEHAVIOR Summary The recent pandemic COVID-19 has caused serious political, social, economic, demographic and other types of problems besides population’s health issues. It is difficult to fight the mentioned problem as there are uncertainties concerning the origin and development of the pandemic, as well as the fact that we do not yet possess a vaccine and medication against the virus, etc. The pandemic is directly linked with demographic factors and millions of demographic losses. The gravity of COVID-19 depends not only on the condition of a country’s health system and future measures of policy, but also on the demographic factors. In particular, it relies on the age structure of population, regional movement, migration, social behavior, the degree of self-care of individuals, families and society at large, etc. These are the basic factors that determine how grave the consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic will be in the world and in separate countries. In accordance with the World Health Organization’s conclusion, the risk of children’s infection must be higher in developing and poor countries than in developed ones. The contrary is true among the elderly of the developed countries. From this standpoint, according to the data of Table 1, in the region of Caucasus, Georgia and Armenia have higher risks of hypothetical population infection than does Azerbaijan in terms of the same age indicators (among them persons aged above 80). However, since the emergence of the COVID-19, in other words, during four months, the quantity of the infected and deceased was much less in Georgia compared to the above-mentioned two neighboring countries. We see the analogous situation when we compare Georgia with the other countries of the world. One of the elements of social security (in terms of health) is self-caring behavior of an individual or a society toward health, which is a form of relationship between the individuals (care and self-care) and is characterized by activities of various levels. Nowadays, under the circumstances of the pandemic, the attitude of self-caring behavior belongs to the social level, inasmuch as social demands, motivation of overcoming the pandemic as well as imagining the acceptable behavior in order to make an appropriate decision, come to the forefront. Thus, people and societies can, as a result of their self-caring behavior, avoid becoming infected during a pandemic and decrease the level of diseases and mortality. In this regard, citizens have to take heed of and fulfil the recommendations of government and Word Health Organization.