Data set: 50 Muslim-majority countries and 50 richest non-Muslim countries based on GDP: Total number of COVID-19 cases and deaths on September 18, 2020

Associated with manuscript titled: Fifty Muslim-majority countries have fewer COVID-19 cases and deaths than the 50 richest non-Muslim countries

The objective of this research was to determine the difference in the total number of COVID-19 cases and deaths between Muslim-majority and non-Muslim countries, and investigate reasons for the disparities.

Methods: The 50 Muslim-majority countries had more than 50.0% Muslims with an average of 87.5%. The non-Muslim country sample consisted of 50 countries with the highest GDP while omitting any Muslim-majority countries listed. The non-Muslim countries’ average percentage of Muslims was 4.7%. Data pulled on September 18, 2020 included the percentage of Muslim population per country by World Population Review15 and GDP per country, population count, and total number of COVID-19 cases and deaths by Worldometers.16 The data set was transferred via an Excel spreadsheet on September 23, 2020 and analyzed. To measure COVID-19’s incidence in the countries, three different Average Treatment Methods (ATE) were used to validate the results.

Results published as a preprint at https://doi.org/10.31235/osf.io/84zq5

(15) Muslim Majority Countries 2020 [Internet]. Walnut (CA): World Population Review. 2020- [Cited 2020 Sept 28]. Available from: http://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/muslim-majority-countries

(16) Worldometers.info. Worldometer. Dover (DE): Worldometer; 2020 [cited 2020 Sept 28]. Available from: http://worldometers.info