brb243
But I am an Effective Altruist, Helen -- 😓 By definition, as a member of the Effective Altruism community, no matter what I do or what I ask. Of course, engaging with the movement, I am more likely to expand my moral circles, gain knowledge and motivation to do great, et cetera, just like the other Effective Altruists. Held accountable by the institution itself, I enter, remain, or exit freely.
Universal cost-effectiveness calculator
Hello!
I found the dataset that I thought I saw before: the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) Global Burden of Disease Study 2017 (GBD 2017) Disability Weights. Disability weights are the changes of Health-related Quality of Life (HRQoL) due to a condition. I re-ran the calculations and found the cost-effectiveness of the mobile clinics project as 26.63 USD/QALY, with a low estimate of 184.14 USD/QALY and high estimate of 6.33 USD/QALY. I used the same data to estimate the cost-effectiveness of AMF and found 56.07 USD/QALY (low 112.14 and high 11.21). The Business Insider AMF number is about 49.76 USD/QALY. Thus, these updated calculations may be more accurate. Still, the calculations do not take into account the preventive care outcomes, deaths averted due to the Ebola outbreak response, and economic benefits (e. g. of deworming) that may lead to further health improvements, leave alone the positive long-term virtuous cycle of improved health and wealth—but that may apply to other health-related programs too.
OK. I can see it on and download it from Google Drive. Perhaps this link:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1fve0AA56HRPZF2U1_cJ0Jrqj1JPfojba/view?usp=sharing
?
I can also send via e-mail, feel free to message.
When one is portraying reality accurately (people living on standards far below those of advanced economies), there may seem to be no problem (people living peacefully on the fields or in slums, disabled people asking for funds, sick persons resting at home). It is just the reality; these people are just a part of the picture. They are accepted by the society, although perhaps not as much catered to.
I am actually thinking that both portraying someone’s negative emotional appeal (that does not allow the addressee to reject donating to the acceptance and end of relationship of the appealer) and portraying an opportunity to make a great impact put the intended beneficiaries into a subordinate position. The latter only necessitates different emotional work of the portrayed—exhibiting joy and proudly grateful performance as opposed to hatred and feeling of injustice. Since those in relative power may wish to feel that they are appreciated/loved by independent persons, the latter may be a better ‘customer care’ for the donors.
The best case would be perhaps sincere reality, with all its benefits (e. g. good relationships) and economic donation opportunities. No emotions directed to the audience. This would also enable donors to make independent decisions, doing good for absolutely nothing in return.
Now the question is how effective the portrayal of just people living somewhere be in soliciting donations. I hope that highly, because providing unconditional love is what makes people feel truly well.
I think that thinking about longtermism enables people to feel empowered to solve problems somewhat beyond the reality, truly feeling the prestige/privilege/knowing-better of ‘doing the most good’- also, this may be a viewpoint applicable for those who really do not have to worry about finances, but also that is relative. Which also links to my second point that some affluent persons enjoy speaking about innovative solutions, reflecting current power structures defined by high-technology, among others. It would be otherwise hard to make a community of people feeling the prestige of being paid a little to do good or donating to marginally improve some of the current global institutions, that cause the present problems. Or wouldit
Hello. I apologize for the late reply. I was moving over the weekend. I am looking at the IHME DALY by cause data (my calculations here) but these do not seem to take into account the long-term effects of the diseases. For example, deworming and vitamin A supplementation may have positive long-term effects in terms of schooling and economic gains that may far outweigh the direct short-term QALY losses. From there the upper estimate of 5. Simple malaria I would presume one that does not require immediate medical attention but one that still may result in severe condition if untreated (CDC). For the life-threatening conditions, my rationale was also that children treated with severe acute malnutrition are younger than average-age patients and that persons who survive 5 years live on average longer than life expectancy.
Also, the QALY estimates are not taking into account the effects of preventive measures—e. g. almost 90,000 persons informed on STIs and the response to a cholera outbreak (training and material provided) - before the intervention, 5 persons died, after no other deaths occurred.
On that note, I would actually appreciate if anyone could provide more credible estimates, taking into account the effectiveness and long-term consequences of the treatment. I am sure that REO would welcome such cooperation, also for capacity building reasons.
The diagnosis numbers are data of the past ~5 months of the project scaled up to 6 months (×208/154 (clinic-weeks)). REO records data on all diagnoses (by week) and the provided are the sums.
For the QALY estimates, I used my best judgment, also based on the potential decrease of the Health-related Quality of Life (HRQoL) multiplied by the years lived with the (consequences of the) condition (equivalent Years Lost due to Disability) and on the potential Years of Live Lost. For example, for the mild condition treatments, deworming or vitamin A supplementation can have great long-term quality of life effect. However, treating other minor conditions may have only relatively small short-term effects. Thus, the wide ranges in estimates.
In terms of the QALY improvement, this will depend on the facility of treatment of the condition. For example, treating severe malaria, severe acute malnutrition, averting maternal deaths due to antenatal care, or deworming may be relatively easier than treating cancer, cardiovascular disease, or hypertension. This should be already factored in the ranges—for example, for life-threatening conditions, the upper QALY estimate is that the clinics save all lives and the lower estimate is that perhaps only ~1/3 of lives is saved or that all interventions save a life but its quality is decreased by 67 percentage points, or a combination of the two that results in the same increase in overall quality×quantity of life.
A counterfactual QALY for USD 2.60–28.94?
Data Analysis Involvement Opportunity (~10 hours)
Perhaps just randomly: the Trade for Sustainable Development scoring of the International Trade Centre includes a list of companies implementing 14 certifiable voluntary sustainability standards. According to some trade experts, the cost of certification is often the bigger hindrance the smaller the company is. Also, the profits of a sustainable enterprise may go to the middle-income managers as opposed to the low-skilled workers (one research).
Also, Resonance works on impact investing. I do not believe that they focus on reporting/scoring but could be a valuable resource to inquire about the landscape and perhaps criteria.
Do you know of the T100 project of the Toniic impact investing community and the IRIS+ metrics of the GIIN impact investing network?
Should social return on investment (increase in everyone’s profits/investment) be considered (One Acre Fund, Babban Gona, ImpactMatters top list)? Should the idea that the value of life may be ~proportional to the GDP/capita of an area be considered?
Hello. I studied lobbying in DC during my MA in International Trade and Economic Diplomacy. I also tried to estimate the cost-effectiveness of lobbying per QALY—and came up with $280 per quality life (or about $4.7/QALY) (p. 3) or the first draft on the EA Forum.
I think that EA Brazil and some others are working on starting an EA lobbying group. I dm’d you regarding this.
(reference to a Nigerian social impact bond here) “Investors can opt to purchase Babban Gona’s Raise Out of Poverty bond (ROPO). ROPO is Nigeria’s first social impact bond that enables investors attain a reasonable return on their investment” I wonder if social impact bonds have been considered by EA—or, if these are not where EA has comparative advantage, at least static.
Perhaps social impact bonds create additional impact for every bond purchased—room for investment is limited only by the capacity of persons to increase their income. This contrasts with impact investment to specific companies (e. g. those that are competitive at gaining capital) where additional investment may displace someone else’s investment—research by Founders Pledge.
Also, check out this comment.
OK, thank you.
Hello Sindy,
Thank you so much. This answers my question. Yes, there will be a before and after qualitative survey asking about own and others’ behavior—which may need to be truncated to speak with more different groups. Then, the face covering data can be used to complement the survey information.
Thank you. I was not able to get (a pdf of) Field Experiments, but downloaded the “Field Experimental Designs for the Study of Media Effects,” also co-authored by Green. They point out “robust cluster standard errors” to estimate “individual-level average treatment effect” (172).
To answer your points:
The smallest effect size you would hope to observe
20%. From 5⁄10 to 6⁄10 or equivalent % increase
Your available resources
Researchers in all of the campaign clusters and some of the non-campaign ones. They can count whether e. g. few hundreds of individuals wear face covering
The population within each cluster
Different, average of 180,000⁄6 = 30,000.
The total population
Since we are just looking to estimate the impact of the 180,000-person campaign and not to generalize it, this should be 180,000x2 (180,000 participating and an equal number of non-participants who are the nearest geographically and in characteristics).
Your analysis methodology
Probit, logit or simple linear regression, but open to suggestions
I meant 6 groups in the intervention area, and some number of groups (e. g. 3 or 6) in the non-intervention area.
OK. So 3 intervention clusters and 3 non-intervention clusters are better than 6 intervention clusters and 3 non-intervention clusters but 6+6 may be necessary? Would the answer depend on the intra-cluster correlation coefficient (ρ)? Perhaps, the texts that generally talk about clustering assume relatively significant between cluster variability and low within cluster variability (so high ρ). However, in this study, how people respond to the messaging may not depend much on their ‘cluster assignment,’ but much more on their individual characteristics that, on average, may be comparable across the clusters and the studied population.
I should ask EA Cameroon about the possibility of different average responses in different villages.
Do you know of any online sample size calculator that includes clusters?
What about the Cameroonian Civil War that (or at least of which effects) can be mitigated by a combination of EA and local knowledge? This can be a potentially high-impact problem/intervention that has not been covered by other EA research, perhaps due to its localized nature.
Hi! This one should be taken care of. I can let you know about other opps.