Relative to the above, I calculate GiveWellâs top charities are 4.12 times as cost-effective, and corporate campaigns for chicken welfare, such as the ones supported by The Humane League (THL), 6.35 k times.
I Fermi estimate the cost-effectiveness of epidemic/âpandemic preparedness of 0.00236 DALY/â$ multiplying:
The expected annual epidemic/âpandemic disease burden of 68.2 MDALY. I obtained this from the product between:
The expected annual epidemic/âpandemic deaths of 1.61 M, which I determined multiplying:
The epidemic/âpandemic deaths per human-year from 1500 to 2023 of 1.98*10^-4, which is the ratio between 160 M epidemic/âpandemic deaths, and 808 G human-years from Marani et. al 2021[1].
The disease burden per death in 2021 of 42.4 DALY.
The relative reduction of the expected annual epidemic/âpandemic disease burden per annual cost of 3.46 %/âG$. I got this aggregating the following estimates with the geometric mean:
âWe extend the World Bankâs assumptions to include bioterrorism and biowarfareâthat is, we assume that the healthcare infrastructure would reduce bioterrorism and biowarfare fatalities by 20%â.
âWe calculate that purchasing 1 centuryâs worth of global protection in this form would cost on the order of $250 billion, assuming that subsequent maintenance costs are lower but that the entire system needs intermittent upgradingâ.
30 % is the mean between 10 % and 50 %, which are the values studied in Table 2.
âWe find that the sum of our median cost estimates of primary prevention (~$20 billion) are ~1/â20 of the low-end annualized value of lives lost to emerging viral zoonoses and <1/â10 of the annualized economic lossesâ.
Relative to epidemic/âpandemic preparedness, I calculate:
GiveWellâs top charities are 4.21 (= 0.00994/â0.00236) times as cost-effective.
Corporate campaigns for chicken welfare, such as the ones supported by THL, are 6.35 k (= 15.0/â0.00236) times as cost-effective.
^ 1 G stands for 1 billion. I assumed 5 k deaths (= (0 + 10)/â2*10^3) for epidemics/âpandemics qualitatively inferred (said) to have caused less than 10 k deaths, which are coded as having caused â999 (0) deaths. I also considered the deaths from COVID-19, which is not in the original dataset.
Cost-effectiveness of epidemic/âpandemic preparedness
Summary
I Fermi estimate the cost-effectiveness of epidemic/âpandemic preparedness is 0.00236 DALY/â$.
Relative to the above, I calculate GiveWellâs top charities are 4.12 times as cost-effective, and corporate campaigns for chicken welfare, such as the ones supported by The Humane League (THL), 6.35 k times.
Calculations
My calculations are in this Sheet.
I Fermi estimate the cost-effectiveness of epidemic/âpandemic preparedness of 0.00236 DALY/â$ multiplying:
The expected annual epidemic/âpandemic disease burden of 68.2 MDALY. I obtained this from the product between:
The expected annual epidemic/âpandemic deaths of 1.61 M, which I determined multiplying:
The epidemic/âpandemic deaths per human-year from 1500 to 2023 of 1.98*10^-4, which is the ratio between 160 M epidemic/âpandemic deaths, and 808 G human-years from Marani et. al 2021[1].
The population predicted for 2024 of 8.12 G.
The disease burden per death in 2021 of 42.4 DALY.
The relative reduction of the expected annual epidemic/âpandemic disease burden per annual cost of 3.46 %/âG$. I got this aggregating the following estimates with the geometric mean:
8 %/âG$ (= 0.2/â(250*10^9/â100)), which is based on Millett & Snyder-Beattie 2017:
âWe extend the World Bankâs assumptions to include bioterrorism and biowarfareâthat is, we assume that the healthcare infrastructure would reduce bioterrorism and biowarfare fatalities by 20%â.
âWe calculate that purchasing 1 centuryâs worth of global protection in this form would cost on the order of $250 billion, assuming that subsequent maintenance costs are lower but that the entire system needs intermittent upgradingâ.
1.5 %/âG$ (= 0.3/â(20*10^9)), which is based on Bernstein et. al 2022:
30 % is the mean between 10 % and 50 %, which are the values studied in Table 2.
âWe find that the sum of our median cost estimates of primary prevention (~$20 billion) are ~1/â20 of the low-end annualized value of lives lost to emerging viral zoonoses and <1/â10 of the annualized economic lossesâ.
Relative to epidemic/âpandemic preparedness, I calculate:
GiveWellâs top charities are 4.21 (= 0.00994/â0.00236) times as cost-effective.
Corporate campaigns for chicken welfare, such as the ones supported by THL, are 6.35 k (= 15.0/â0.00236) times as cost-effective.
^ 1 G stands for 1 billion. I assumed 5 k deaths (= (0 + 10)/â2*10^3) for epidemics/âpandemics qualitatively inferred (said) to have caused less than 10 k deaths, which are coded as having caused â999 (0) deaths. I also considered the deaths from COVID-19, which is not in the original dataset.