A feasible and more efficient SARS-Cov-2 vaccine allocation to states and counties in the USA

  1. Anthony R. Ives
  2. Claudio Bozzuto

Reviewed by

Read the full article See related articles

Discuss this preprint

Start a discussion What are Sciety discussions?

Listed in

Log in to save this article

Abstract

While discussion of vaccine allocation has centered around who should be prioritized (e.g., health care personnel and the elderly), we argue that vaccines should also be allocated to jurisdictions (e.g., counties within the USA) with the greatest immunization thresholds needed for ending the epidemic. At the current rate of vaccine distribution (March 15, 2021), universal herd immunity in the USA could be reached in roughly 4.5 months. However, distributing vaccines according to where the virus spreads more easily (dense counties with high R 0 values), herd immunity would be reached simultaneously in all counties almost two months earlier and would require roughly 40% fewer vaccine doses. Furthermore, under the current distribution strategy densely populated counties would reach herd immunity last, with negative epidemiological and socio-economic consequences. In sum, it would be more fair and efficient to distribute vaccines to jurisdictions that need them most to reach herd immunity.

Article activity feed

  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2021.03.17.21253793: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board Statementnot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

    SciScore is an automated tool that is designed to assist expert reviewers by finding and presenting formulaic information scattered throughout a paper in a standard, easy to digest format. SciScore checks for the presence and correctness of RRIDs (research resource identifiers), and for rigor criteria such as sex and investigator blinding. For details on the theoretical underpinning of rigor criteria and the tools shown here, including references cited, please follow this link.

  2. Version published to 10.1101/2021.03.17.21253793 on medRxiv