Ensuring access to medical equipment and medicines is one of the most immediate issues arising from the COVID-19 crisis. Health services not only need these to fight the virus, but also to protect their workers and others from infection. Increasingly, workers employed in other critical sectors, and the wider public, are also relying on protective garments, such as plastic gloves or facemasks, to reduce transmission.

This note looks at the trade links between countries in some of the products that matter for the fight against COVID-19 (referred to as COVID-19 goods). It uses a recently developed World Customs Organisation (WCO) list identifying COVID-19 critical products, which includes test-kits, protective garments, medical devices and disinfectants and trade data from the BACI database to identify trade in these products during the latest available year (2018). While slightly dated, this trade data can nonetheless help identify top suppliers and consumers of some of the products that matter for the fight against COVID-19.