Toxvaerd Flavio, Rowthorn Robert
Faculty of Economics, University of Cambridge, United Kingdom.
CEPR, United Kingdom.
J Econ Theory. 2022 Sep;204:105501. doi: 10.1016/j.jet.2022.105501. Epub 2022 Jun 10.
This paper considers a susceptible-infected-recovered type model of infectious diseases, such as COVID-19 or swine flu, in which costly treatment or vaccination confers immunity on recovered individuals. Once immune, individuals indirectly protect the remaining susceptibles, who benefit from a measure of herd immunity. Treatment and vaccination directly induce such herd immunity, which builds up over time. Optimal treatment is shown to involve intervention at early stages of the epidemic, while optimal vaccination may defer intervention to intermediate stages. Thus, while treatment and vaccination have superficial similarities, their effects and desirability at different stages of the epidemic are different. Equilibrium vaccination is qualitatively similar to socially optimal vaccination, while equilibrium treatment differs in nature from socially optimal treatment. The optimal policies are compared to traditional non-economic public health interventions which rely on herd immunity thresholds.
本文考虑了一种传染病的易感-感染-康复型模型，如新冠病毒或猪流感，其中昂贵的治疗或疫苗接种能使康复个体获得免疫力。一旦获得免疫，个体就能间接保护其余的易感者，这些易感者会从一定程度的群体免疫中受益。治疗和疫苗接种直接诱导这种群体免疫，且这种免疫会随着时间积累。结果表明，最优治疗措施包括在疫情早期进行干预，而最优疫苗接种措施可能会将干预推迟到中期阶段。因此，虽然治疗和疫苗接种有表面上的相似之处，但它们在疫情不同阶段的效果和可取性是不同的。均衡疫苗接种在性质上与社会最优疫苗接种相似，而均衡治疗在本质上与社会最优治疗不同。将最优政策与依赖群体免疫阈值的传统非经济公共卫生干预措施进行了比较。
