Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Apr;2(4):223-233.
doi: 10.1038/s43588-022-00233-0. Epub 2022 Apr 28.

Optimizing social and economic activity while containing SARS-CoV-2 transmission using DAEDALUS

David J Haw  1 , Giovanni Forchini  1   2 , Patrick Doohan  1 , Paula Christen  1 , Matteo Pianella  1 , Robert Johnson  1 , Sumali Bajaj  3 , Alexandra B Hogan  4   5 , Peter Winskill  1 , Marisa Miraldo  6 , Peter J White  1   7 , Azra C Ghani  1 , Neil M Ferguson  1 , Peter C Smith  6   8 , Katharina D Hauck  9
Affiliations

Optimizing social and economic activity while containing SARS-CoV-2 transmission using DAEDALUS

David J Haw et al. Nat Comput Sci. 2022 Apr.

Abstract

To study the trade-off between economic, social and health outcomes in the management of a pandemic, DAEDALUS integrates a dynamic epidemiological model of SARS-CoV-2 transmission with a multi-sector economic model, reflecting sectoral heterogeneity in transmission and complex supply chains. The model identifies mitigation strategies that optimize economic production while constraining infections so that hospital capacity is not exceeded but allowing essential services, including much of the education sector, to remain active. The model differentiates closures by economic sector, keeping those sectors open that contribute little to transmission but much to economic output and those that produce essential services as intermediate or final consumption products. In an illustrative application to 63 sectors in the United Kingdom, the model achieves an economic gain of between £161 billion (24%) and £193 billion (29%) compared to a blanket lockdown of non-essential activities over six months. Although it has been designed for SARS-CoV-2, DAEDALUS is sufficiently flexible to be applicable to pandemics with different epidemiological characteristics.

PubMed Disclaimer

References

    1. IMF. World Economic Outlook Update: A Crisis Like No Other, An Uncertain Recovery (IMF, 2020); https://www.imf.org/en/Publications/WEO/Issues/2020/06/24/WEOUpdateJune2020
    1. Mandel, A. & Veetil, V. P. The economic cost of Covid lockdowns: an out-of-equilibrium analysis. Econ. Disasters Clim. Change 4, 431–451 (2020). - DOI
    1. Coibion, O., Gorodnichenko, Y. & Weber, M. The Cost of the COVID-19 Crisis: Lockdowns, Macroeconomic Expectations and Consumer Spending. Report 0898-2937 (IZA, 2020).
    1. Tenreyro, S. COVID 19 and the Economy: What Are the Lessons So Far? – Speech by Silvana Tenreyro (2020); https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/speech/2020/silvana-tenreyro-speech-as-p...
    1. ONS. Which Occupations Have the Highest Potential Exposure to the Coronavirus (COVID-19)? (ONS, 2020); https://www.ons.gov.uk/employmentandlabourmarket/peopleinwork/employment...

LinkOut - more resources