The COVID-19 vaccination program in India illustrates key economic concepts such as positive externalities, public goods, and market failure. Vaccination provides private marginal benefits (PMB), such as personal health protection, but also generates social marginal benefits (SMB) by reducing virus transmission and easing the burden on healthcare systems. The SMB is greater than the PMB because society benefits more from widespread vaccination than individuals do. Without intervention, the market would lead to under-vaccination, as individuals do not account for these external benefits, leading to a socially suboptimal outcome. To address this market failure, government intervention through free or subsidized vaccines ensures that the positive externalities are internalized, aligning private incentives with social benefits. This helps achieve the socially optimal outcome, where the SMB equals the social marginal cost (SMC). By making vaccines widely accessible, the government corrects the under-consumption of vaccines, ensuring public health is maximized and the broader societal benefits are fully realized. Explain this in economic terms and concept using graph and elaborate on policy implications.

The COVID-19 vaccination program in India illustrates key economic concepts such as positive externalities, public goods, and market failure. Vaccination provides private marginal benefits (PMB), such as personal health protection, but also generates social marginal benefits (SMB) by reducing virus transmission and easing the burden on healthcare systems. The SMB is greater than the PMB because society benefits more from widespread vaccination than individuals do. Without intervention, the market would lead to under-vaccination, as individuals do not account for these external benefits, leading to a socially suboptimal outcome. To address this market failure, government intervention through free or subsidized vaccines ensures that the positive externalities are internalized, aligning private incentives with social benefits. This helps achieve the socially optimal outcome, where the SMB equals the social marginal cost (SMC). By making vaccines widely accessible, the government corrects the under-consumption of vaccines, ensuring public health is maximized and the broader societal benefits are fully realized. Explain this in economic terms and concept using graph and elaborate on policy implications.

EBK HEALTH ECONOMICS AND POLICY

7th Edition

ISBN:9781337668279

Author:Henderson

Publisher:Henderson

Chapter5: Demand For Health And Medical Care

Section: Chapter Questions

Problem 3QAP

See similar textbooks

Similar questions

Suppose Homer and Smithers are in the same health insurance pool and they pay the same premium for their health insurance. Suppose further, that the SNPP discriminates against employees on the basis of body weight so that a negative wage penalty is associated with obesity. Finally, suppose Homer eschews exercise and loves jelly donuts much more than Smithers does. As a result, Homer also has much higher expected medical expenditures. Does Homer impose a negative externality on Smithers? Explain why or why not, and describe carefully any assumptions you need to answer this question.
Please answer (Question. 3) for this.
Discuss whether public health and the economy are complementary or competing goals in the pandemic.
How do preferences on the available vaccine for COVID19 affect or contribute to microeconomics? Please answer in 250 words.
Indicate whether the statement is true or false, and justify your answer.Herd immunity is a negative health externality.
Do COVID-19 Vaccines create external benefit? Why? Then should the government subsidize this activity?
The UN Committee on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (CESCR) is charged with interpreting the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (ICESR). In 2000 the Committee released General Comment 14, “The Right to the Highest Attainable Standard of Health”. The General Comment is important for advancing our understanding of a right to health under international law because it: (choose one) A) Sets out what has become known as the “3AQ model” addressing the conditions for health on the basis of Availability, Accessibility, Acceptability, and Quality. B) Creates new, specific obligations with respect to the delivery health care services that are binding on all countries of the world C) Makes it clear that the absence of a right to health in the Canadian Charter or Rights and Freedoms means that Canada is in clear violation of its obligations under the ICESR. D) Offers an account of a right to health that has been used by health advocates around the world E) A, B…
Suppose we allocate a fixed budget for tuberculosis screening between two alternatives: screening the population generally, which has a marginal cost per test of MCG and a marginal benefit of MBG additional cases detected per test, and screening in homeless shelters, with a corresponding MCS and MBS. Assume it is currently true that MBG/MCG < MBS/MCS. Understanding that MB decreases (increases) as quantity increases (decreases) and the reverse is true for MC, we can conclude that: a. too much screening is being done at homeless shelters relative to general screening. b. too much general screening is being done relative to screening at homeless shelters. c. the price of screening in homeless shelters is too high. d. the allocation is already optimal if there is a fixed budget because we can’t equate the ratios of marginal benefit and marginal cost. e. we can only make the allocation optimal if the prices can be changed
Build and secure a market based economic intervention to address the social determinants of health.
In order to suppress the spread of a viral disease, the government has resorted to nonpharmaceutical interventions (NPIs) that restrict the mobility of individuals such as quarantine and lockdown. Provide an economic framework, based on private and social benefits and costs that could guide the government in selecting the appropriate form and level of NPI. In the absence of a highly contagious disease, an individual engaging in activity x does not externalize any cost to others. In the presence of the disease, then an infected individual can transmit the disease to others during the performance of his or her activities. a. Discuss the nature of the externality, if there is any.
Indicate whether the statement is true or false, and justify your answer.Every antibiotic taken causes a net social loss by contributing to antibiotic resistance.
In the US, public insurers such as Medicare are forbidden by law from applying formal health technology assessments – and in particular, cost-effectiveness analyses – in deciding whether to cover new health technologies, no matter how expensive. By contrast, in Beveridge countries, centralized health technology assessment is required before the public health care system will cover expensive new technologies. What is the nature of the social costs associated with covering a new technology in a Beveridge public health care system? What is the nature of the social costs associated with not covering a new technology in such a system? What economic problem does centralized health technology assessment partially address?