The response of governments to the COVID-19 outbreak was foremost oriented to two objectives: saving lives and limiting economic losses. However, the effectiveness and success factors of interventions were unknown ex-ante. This study aims to shed light on the drivers of countries' performances...

Countries have employed a variety of non-pharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) in order to curtail the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the success of individual measures in reducing the number of infections remains controversial. This paper exploits a panel data set of 107 countries to estimate the...

Facing unprecedented uncertainty and drastic trade-offs between public health and other forms of human well-being, policy makers during the Covid-19 pandemic have sought the guidance of epidemiologists and economists. Unfortunately, while both groups of scientists use many of the same basic...

Facing unprecedented uncertainty and drastic trade-offs between public health and other forms of human well-being, policymakers during the Covid-19 pandemic have sought the guidance of epidemiologists and economists. Unfortunately, while both groups of scientists use many of the same basic...

The COVID-19 pandemic has impacted multiple facets of our lives and created a number of legal and ethical dilemmas. One of the greatest challenges at present is the production and distribution of the COVID-19 vaccine. Refusing to supply COVID vaccines widely could affect millions worldwide, and...

The COVID-19 pandemic has forced countries to make difficult ethical choices, e.g., how to balance public health and socioeconomic activity and whom to prioritize in allocating vaccines or other scarce medical resources. We discuss the implications of benefit-cost analysis, utilitarianism, and...

We consider several epidemiological simulations of the COVID-19 pandemic using the textbook SIR model and discuss the basic implications of these results for crafting an adequate response to the ensuing economic crisis. Our simulations are meant to be illustrative of the findings reported in...

As evidence of the negative effects of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) has mounted, an increasingly popular public policy response has been to impose restrictions on smoking through 100% smoke-free bans (comprehensive smoking bans). Yet sparse information exists regarding the impact these...

Improving access to health care and financial protection of the poor is a key concern for policymakers in low- and middle-income countries, but there have been few rigorous program evaluations. The Medical Insurance Program for the Poor in the republic of Georgia provides a free and extensive...

The national hepatitis C elimination initiative provides an opportunity to dramatically expand access to hepatitis C virus (HCV) treatment and put the US on a path to eliminating hepatitis C. Our objective was to project the health benefits and cost savings of this initiative. A previously...