1. Introduction to the special issue on new insights into economic epidemiology: Theory and policy.
- Author
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Amir, Rabah and Boucekkine, Raouf
- Subjects
EPIDEMIOLOGY ,MATHEMATICAL economics ,COMMUNICABLE diseases ,SPACE in economics ,ENERGY economics ,FISCAL policy - Abstract
FOUNDATIONS AND EFFICIENCY ANALYSIS OF SANITARY POLICIES The first section of this special issue tackles a number of important research questions related to the foundations and design of epidemic control policies. It particularly focuses on the comparison between the herd immunity policies (as followed in Sweden in the first COVID wave) and lockdown policies under the capacity constraints of the health system (and in particular, the capacity of intensive care units, the so-called ICU constraint), more commonly conducted in Europe in this period of time. Another nice feature of the paper is to provide an accurate introduction to the theory of herd immunity policies (in particular to the inherent concept of overshooting), not at all accounted for in the first wave of COVID-related literature which was overwhelmingly focused on lockdown and testing policies. While the entire planet seems to coexist with COVID without major problems at present, as almost all the preventive measures have been lifted, there is increasing concern among epidemiologists and expert scientists that the worse of COVID-19 might not yet be over. [Extracted from the article]
- Published
- 2022
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