Decision Making: Applications in Management and Engineering Vol. 5, Issue 2, 2022, pp. 372-395 ISSN: 2560-6018 eISSN: 2620-0104 DOI: https://doi.org/10.31181/dmame0318062022t * Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: stuzcu@politics.ankara.edu.tr (S. E. Tuzcu), spturkoglu@ybu.edu.tr (S. P. Türkoğlu) HOW VULNERABLE ARE HIGH-INCOME COUNTRIES TO THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC? AN MCDM APPROACH Sevgi Eda Tuzcu 1 * and Serap Pelin Türkoğlu 2 1 Ankara University, Faculty of Political Sciences, Department of Business Administration, Ankara, Turkey. 2 Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University, Şereflikoçhisar Berat Cömertoğlu Vocational School, Department of Management and Organization, Ankara, Turkey. Received: 4 March 2022; Accepted: 13 May 2022; Available online: 18 June 2022. Original scientific paper Abstract: This paper tries to determine the most vulnerable points of high– income countries during the Covid-19 pandemic in an MCDM setting. For this aim, we use the entropy method to obtain criteria weights and the PIV method for the comparisons. We employ a wide range of criteria that account for political, demographic, capacity, and Covid-19 indicators including vaccination. Our sample consists of 40 HICs. The results reveal that countries with less equitable healthcare systems and with more vaccine hesitancy are more vulnerable to Covid-19. Hospital bed capacity, a strict government policy, and a lower percentage of the population who smoke add to the success of countries in this combat. We compare our findings with SAW and MAUT techniques as well and obtain very similar rankings. Therefore, we conclude that the PIV method can be used for national performance evaluations with a reduced rank reversal problem and computational simplicity. Key words: High–Income Countries, MCDM, Entropy Method, PIV Method, Covid-19 Pandemic. 1. Introduction The unexpected start of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 has exacerbated debates over how to respond to the spread of infectious disease nationwide. At the beginning of the pandemic, all countries applied similar strategies. Within time, it turns out that the same strategies have not provided parallel results for everybody. The national performance, in other words, the success in this pandemic is highly related to the countries’ own dynamics. During the pandemic, it is put forth clearly that low– and middle–income countries (LMICs) are more open to the spread of this disease and its negative consequences due to lack of social distancing, crowded households, extreme