VoxEU column: Public preferences for prioritising a COVID-19 vaccine

Jeroen Luyten, Roselinde Kessels, Sandy Tubeuf*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Book/ReportReportAcademic

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Abstract

With the news of promising Covid-19 vaccines on the horizon comes a new challenge. The initial supply will not be sufficient to vaccinate everyone and choices will need to made over distribution. This column presents the results of an experiment in Belgium investigating people’s preferences regarding the distribution of a scarce vaccine. There was no one single strategy that was considered best by a large majority, but three strategies were ranked first by between 20-30% of respondents: prioritising essential workers, the chronically ill, and older people. Libertarian-inspired approaches (such as highest willingness-to-pay or ‘first-come, first served’) and a strict egalitarian approach (such as a lottery) were clearly the least preferred options.
Original languageEnglish
PublisherThe Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)
Number of pages4
Publication statusPublished - 25 Nov 2020

Keywords

  • COVID-19
  • Health economics
  • Vaccines
  • Public opinion
  • Belgium
  • Healthcare

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