Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives
The COVAX program aims to provide global equitable access to life-saving vaccines. Despite calls for increased sharing, vaccine protectionism has limited progress towards vaccine sharing goals. For example, as of April 2022 only ~20% of the population in Africa had received at least one COVID-19 vac...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Public Library of Science (PLoS)
2022-01-01
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| Series: | PLOS Global Public Health |
| Online Access: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10021782/?tool=EBI |
| _version_ | 1797700971603689472 |
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| author | Shashwat Shivam Joshua S. Weitz Yorai Wardi |
| author_facet | Shashwat Shivam Joshua S. Weitz Yorai Wardi |
| author_sort | Shashwat Shivam |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The COVAX program aims to provide global equitable access to life-saving vaccines. Despite calls for increased sharing, vaccine protectionism has limited progress towards vaccine sharing goals. For example, as of April 2022 only ~20% of the population in Africa had received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose. Here we use a two-nation coupled epidemic model to evaluate optimal vaccine-sharing policies given a selfish objective: in which countries with vaccine stockpiles aim to minimize fatalities in their own population. Computational analysis of a suite of simulated epidemics reveal that it is often optimal for a donor country to share a significant fraction of its vaccine stockpile with a recipient country that has no vaccine stockpile. Sharing a vaccine stockpile reduces the intensity of outbreaks in the recipient, in turn reducing travel-associated incidence in the donor. This effect is intensified as vaccination rates in a donor country decrease and epidemic coupling between countries increases. Critically, vaccine sharing by a donor significantly reduces transmission and fatalities in the recipient. Moreover, the same computational framework reveals the potential use of hybrid sharing policies that have a negligible effect on fatalities in the donor compared to the optimal policy while significantly reducing fatalities in the recipient. Altogether, these findings provide a self-interested rationale for countries to consider sharing part of their vaccine stockpiles. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:29:36Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-3e08dda9794d48f09cbec0c7bff20c26 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2767-3375 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-12T04:29:36Z |
| publishDate | 2022-01-01 |
| publisher | Public Library of Science (PLoS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | PLOS Global Public Health |
| spelling | doaj.art-3e08dda9794d48f09cbec0c7bff20c262023-09-03T10:09:36ZengPublic Library of Science (PLoS)PLOS Global Public Health2767-33752022-01-01212Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectivesShashwat ShivamJoshua S. WeitzYorai WardiThe COVAX program aims to provide global equitable access to life-saving vaccines. Despite calls for increased sharing, vaccine protectionism has limited progress towards vaccine sharing goals. For example, as of April 2022 only ~20% of the population in Africa had received at least one COVID-19 vaccine dose. Here we use a two-nation coupled epidemic model to evaluate optimal vaccine-sharing policies given a selfish objective: in which countries with vaccine stockpiles aim to minimize fatalities in their own population. Computational analysis of a suite of simulated epidemics reveal that it is often optimal for a donor country to share a significant fraction of its vaccine stockpile with a recipient country that has no vaccine stockpile. Sharing a vaccine stockpile reduces the intensity of outbreaks in the recipient, in turn reducing travel-associated incidence in the donor. This effect is intensified as vaccination rates in a donor country decrease and epidemic coupling between countries increases. Critically, vaccine sharing by a donor significantly reduces transmission and fatalities in the recipient. Moreover, the same computational framework reveals the potential use of hybrid sharing policies that have a negligible effect on fatalities in the donor compared to the optimal policy while significantly reducing fatalities in the recipient. Altogether, these findings provide a self-interested rationale for countries to consider sharing part of their vaccine stockpiles.https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10021782/?tool=EBI |
| spellingShingle | Shashwat Shivam Joshua S. Weitz Yorai Wardi Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives PLOS Global Public Health |
| title | Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| title_full | Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| title_fullStr | Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| title_full_unstemmed | Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| title_short | Vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| title_sort | vaccine stockpile sharing for selfish objectives |
| url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10021782/?tool=EBI |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT shashwatshivam vaccinestockpilesharingforselfishobjectives AT joshuasweitz vaccinestockpilesharingforselfishobjectives AT yoraiwardi vaccinestockpilesharingforselfishobjectives |