![]() Ironically, the free-rider problem that America has helped to encourage may become America’s biggest obstacle to combatting COVID. America’s unrealistic riskless society progression may be a reason it will be even more pervasive. Recognizing the lurking free-rider problem does not mean it is a good outcome, just a realistic expectation. The vaccine reality will assuredly be less than a best-case scenario because the free-rider problem should be expected to exceed even the inherent occurrence with any vaccine - there are those who eschew polio and smallpox vaccination now, despite its long-established efficacy. Even under a best-case vaccine scenario, some risk was going to remain, if for no other reason than the inherent free-rider problem. Yet America has come to act as though risk can and - regardless of cost - must be eradicated. Of course, risk always exists, including in a post-vaccine world. If individuals incur any risk or any cost reduces their return, individuals can erroneously conclude that opting out is the better course. Combined they created an illusion but left a dangerous, risk-free, cost-free baseline that encourages free-riding at the individual level. In so doing, we were rejecting any risk and accepting any cost for its removal. We were increasingly demanding public goods and shifting costs to others. In effect, as a nation America was adopting the free-rider stance. Currently, the commonly discussed level for the available vaccines is 70 percent. Herd immunity is a calculation for the percentage of people needed to be immune to a virus in order to choke off its ability to spread in a population. This risk-to-reward ratio, which already pointed to a heightened free-rider problem, is further increased by the “ herd immunity ” concept. Subtracting from the statistics those most susceptible drops the COVID threat level further still. Both the spread and fatality are much smaller than earlier feared when the virus was overwhelmingly being detected in those most susceptible to it. Of this 4 percent, 97 percent have recovered. ![]() Thus far, roughly 4 percent of Americans have contracted COVID in almost a year. On the ledger’s other side, a reduced reward could be perceived. Combined, these issues argue for an amplified uncertainty and will raise the risk factor in many people’s minds. Unlike other older vaccines, such as those for polio and smallpox, COVID’s will also lack the long real-world usage to supplement clinical trial experience.įurther, there will be questions about two doses being needed and how long they offer protection. This will be no less true with the COVID vaccines, which will have gone through an emergency rush to production. There are side-effect risks inherent in any vaccine. The COVID vaccine presents an enormous opportunity because of its particular risk and reward disparity. Ultimately, it remains the paradox of some benefiting without contributing and thereby undermining a public good. In the 1960s, it was detailed in economics in Garrett Hardin’s “ The Tragedy of the Commons” and in social sciences in Mancur Olson’s The Logic of Collective Action.
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