- theory and concepts
- decision theory
- decision psychology
- probability/bayes
- preferences/values
- priority setting/ethics
- costing methods
- health outcomes
- value of information
- models and tools
- mathematical models
- state-transition
- dynamic transmission
- microsimulation
- calibration/validation
- dynamic simulation
- decision analysis
- business/industry
- culture/society
- economics/finance
- government/law
Resources Repository
-
ArticlePublication 2022Vaccinations versus Lockdowns to Prevent COVID-19 Mortality
This analysis estimated the costs associated with preventing Covid-19 deaths by vaccinations versus lockdowns. Publicly …
This analysis estimated the costs associated with preventing Covid-19 deaths by vaccinations versus lockdowns. Publicly available datasets from the Israeli Ministry of Health were used to model the parameters of the pandemic in Israel. The Oxford COVID-19 Government Response Tracker was used for quantitative data on government policies. Data on the Israeli economy were taken from the Central Bureau of Statistics. The models demonstrate that the first lockdown prevented 1022 COVID-19 deaths at the cost…
Decision Theory | Decision Analysis | State-Transition | Costing Methods | Health Outcomes | Government/Law | Economics/Finance | Infectious Diseases | Policy/Regulation | Health/Medicine | Middle East & North Africa -
ArticlePublication 2007Decision Analysis: A Personal Account of How It Got Started and Evolved
In this chapter, Howard Raiffa discusses the evolution of decision analysis and his personal involvement …
In this chapter, Howard Raiffa discusses the evolution of decision analysis and his personal involvement in its development. He describes the early days of Operations Research (OR) in the late 1940s with its approach to complex, strategic decision making. After reading John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern’s Theory of Games and Economic Behavior (1947) and Abraham Wald’s two books (1947, 1950), he became involved in statistical decision theory. A few years later, after reading Leonard…
Preferences/Values | Probability/Bayes | Decision Theory | Decision Analysis | Business/Industry | Economics/Finance | Operations Research | Energy/Engineering | Health/Medicine -
ArticlePublication 2023Benefits and Costs of COVID-19 Vaccine Mandates
Written mid-pandemic, this article evaluates the direct costs and health benefits of requiring COVID-19 vaccinations …
Written mid-pandemic, this article evaluates the direct costs and health benefits of requiring COVID-19 vaccinations for U.S. federal employees and healthcare and private sector workers. These mandates were controversial and some were halted by litigation. If they had been implemented as intended, the net benefits would depend on the course of the pandemic. If a more transmissible variant (such as Omicron) emerges, the net benefits may be large. If the pandemic instead fades, the benefits…
Mathematical Models | State-Transition | Government/Law | Business/Industry | Economics/Finance | Benefit-Cost Analysis | Infectious Diseases | Policy/Regulation | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2018Trading Bankruptcy for Health: A Discrete-Choice Experiment
This article in Value in Health evaluates the importance of improved health as compared to …
This article in Value in Health evaluates the importance of improved health as compared to improved financial risk protection in the general United States population. Using a discrete-choice experiment, it finds that 31.3% of the population values cure at all costs, and 8.5% of the population use financial solvency to dominate medical decision making. This study shares insight to the US population values and trade-offs between health outcomes and financial health, and highlights the difficult…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Preferences/Values | Health Outcomes | Culture/Society | Economics/Finance | Health Systems | Health/Medicine | North America -
ArticlePublication 2017Policy Makers, the International Community and the Population: Case Study on HIV/AIDS
A four-period game is developed between a policy maker, the international community, and the population. …
A four-period game is developed between a policy maker, the international community, and the population. This research supplements, through implementing strategic interaction, earlier research analyzing "one player at a time." The first two players distribute funds between preventing and treating diseases. The population reacts by degree of risky behavior which may cause no disease, disease contraction, recovery, sickness/death. More funds to prevention implies less disease contraction but higher death rate given disease contraction. The cost…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Mathematical Models | Decision Psychology | Government/Law | Economics/Finance | Infectious Diseases | Health Systems | Global Governance | Health/Medicine | Global -
ArticlePublication 2016“Nudges” in Law and Policy
This article describes research on Americans’ preferences for types of “nudges” in the context of …
This article describes research on Americans’ preferences for types of “nudges” in the context of law and public policy—those that target “system 1” thinking, meaning the intuitive, emotion-based mechanisms, such as graphic warnings and default rules, versus those that target “system 2” thinking, the rational, deliberative form of cognition, such as statistical information or education-based messages.
Priority Setting/Ethics | Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Government/Law | Culture/Society | Policy/Regulation | Health/Medicine -
ArticlePublication 2000Discipline of Cost-Benefit Analysis
Cost-benefit analysis is a general discipline, based on the use of some foundational principles, which …
Cost-benefit analysis is a general discipline, based on the use of some foundational principles, which are not altogether controversial, but have nevertheless considered plausibility. Divisiveness increases as various additional requirements are imposed. There is a trade-off here between easier usability (through locked-up formulae) and more general acceptability (through allowing parametric variations). The paper, by Amartya Sen, examines and scrutinizes the merits and demerits of these additional requirements. The particular variant of cost-benefit approach that is…
Priority Setting/Ethics | Preferences/Values | Government/Law | Culture/Society | Economics/Finance | Benefit-Cost Analysis -
ArticlePublication 2013Estimated Mortality Impact of Vaccinations 2011–2020 in 73 GAVI Alliance Countries
From August to December 2011, a multidisciplinary group with expertise in mathematical modeling was constituted …
From August to December 2011, a multidisciplinary group with expertise in mathematical modeling was constituted by the GAVI Alliance and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to estimate the impact of vaccination in 73 countries supported by the GAVI Alliance. The number of deaths averted in persons projected to be vaccinated during 2011–2020 was estimated for ten antigens: hepatitis B, yellow fever, Haemophilus influenzae type B (Hib), Streptococcus pneumoniae, rotavirus, Neisseria meningitidis serogroup A, Japanese…
Microsimulation | Mathematical Models | Dynamic Transmission | State-Transition | Health Outcomes | Economics/Finance | Infectious Diseases | Global Governance | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | Sub-Saharan Africa | Middle East & North Africa | Latin America & Caribbean | Asia & Pacific -
ArticlePublication 2021Why the Backfire Effect Does Not Explain the Durability of Political Misperceptions
Previous research indicated that corrective information can sometimes provoke a so-called “backfire effect” in which …
Previous research indicated that corrective information can sometimes provoke a so-called “backfire effect” in which respondents more strongly endorsed a misperception about a controversial political or scientific issue when their beliefs or predispositions were challenged. This article shows how subsequent research and media coverage seized on this finding, distorting its generality and exaggerating its role relative to other factors in explaining the durability of political misperceptions. To the contrary, an emerging research consensus finds that…
Preferences/Values | Decision Psychology | Government/Law | Culture/Society | Social Determinants | Health/Medicine | Science/Technology | North America