Date Approved

6-27-2022

Embargo Period

6-27-2024

Document Type

Thesis

Degree Name

M.S. Civil Engineering

Department

Civil and Environmental Engineering

College

Henry M. Rowan College of Engineering

Advisor

Sarah K. Bauer, Ph.D.

Committee Member 1

Jeong Eun Ahn, Ph.D.

Committee Member 2

Jahan Kauser, Ph.D., P.E.

Keywords

COVID-19, Index, Pandemic, Population, Vulnerability

Subject(s)

Public health--New Jersey; Emergency management

Disciplines

Civil and Environmental Engineering

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted countless aspects of everyday life since it was declared a global pandemic by the World Health Organization in March of 2020. From societal to economic impacts, COVID-19 and its variants will leave a lasting impact on our society and the world. Approximately $9 trillion has been spent on fighting the pandemic around the world. During the pandemic, it became increasingly evident that indices, such as the Center for Disease Control (CDC) Social Vulnerability Index (SVI), were extremely important for predicting vulnerabilities in a community. The CDC's SVI provides important estimates on which communities will be more susceptible to 'hazard events' by compiling a variety of data from the U.S. census, as well as data from the American Community Survey. The SVI does not necessarily consider the susceptibility of a community to a Global Pandemic such as COVID-19. Thus, the objectives of this research were to develop a COVID-19 Vulnerability Index (CVI) to evaluate the community's susceptibility to future pandemics. The CVI was validated by comparing to real world COVID-19 data from New Jersey's 21 counties. The results of this study indicate that Essex County had the highest CVI and Hunterdon County had the lowest CVI. This is due to factors such as disparity in wealth, population density, minority status, housing conditions and several other factors that were used to compose the CVI.

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