These are good points and I’m suitably chastened for not being sufficiently thorough in checking Toby Ord’s claims, I’m pleased to see that GiveWell is again investigating treating blindness: http://blog.givewell.org/2017/05/11/update-on-our-views-on-cataract-surgery/. In this very recent post, they say:
“We believe there is evidence that cataract surgeries substantially improve vision. Very roughly, we estimate that the cost-effectiveness of cataract surgery is ~$1,000 per severe visual impairment reversed.[1]” The footnote reads:
“This estimate is on the higher end of the range we calculated, because it assumes additional costs due to demand generation activities, or identifying patients who would not otherwise have known about surgery. We use this figure because we expect that GiveWell is more likely to recommend an organization that can demonstrate, through its demand generation activities, that it is causing additional surgeries to happen. The $1,000 figure also reflects our sense that cost-effectiveness in general tends to worsen (become more expensive) as we spend more time building our model of any intervention. Finally, it is a round figure that communicates our uncertainty about this estimate overall.
But it’s reasonable to say that until they complete this investigation, which will be years rather than months, it may be better to avoid using the example of preventing or curing blindness.”
So the options seem to be either not using the example of blindness at all, or using this rough figure of $1000, with suitable disclaimers. It still leads to 40 cases of severe visual impairment reversed v. 1 case of providing a blind person with a guide dog.
These are good points and I’m suitably chastened for not being sufficiently thorough in checking Toby Ord’s claims,
I’m pleased to see that GiveWell is again investigating treating blindness: http://blog.givewell.org/2017/05/11/update-on-our-views-on-cataract-surgery/. In this very recent post, they say: “We believe there is evidence that cataract surgeries substantially improve vision. Very roughly, we estimate that the cost-effectiveness of cataract surgery is ~$1,000 per severe visual impairment reversed.[1]”
The footnote reads: “This estimate is on the higher end of the range we calculated, because it assumes additional costs due to demand generation activities, or identifying patients who would not otherwise have known about surgery. We use this figure because we expect that GiveWell is more likely to recommend an organization that can demonstrate, through its demand generation activities, that it is causing additional surgeries to happen. The $1,000 figure also reflects our sense that cost-effectiveness in general tends to worsen (become more expensive) as we spend more time building our model of any intervention. Finally, it is a round figure that communicates our uncertainty about this estimate overall. But it’s reasonable to say that until they complete this investigation, which will be years rather than months, it may be better to avoid using the example of preventing or curing blindness.” So the options seem to be either not using the example of blindness at all, or using this rough figure of $1000, with suitable disclaimers. It still leads to 40 cases of severe visual impairment reversed v. 1 case of providing a blind person with a guide dog.
agree :)
It looks like GiveWell put that project on hold in January 2018: https://www.givewell.org/charities/IDinsight/partnership-with-idinsight/cataract-surgery-project