COVID-19, Who To Vaccinate First Among Workers? Lessons From the Italian Crisis

The COVID-19 epidemic, and the lockdowns enforced in many countries, have come at a high cost to the population: a combined health and socioeconomic crisis, with the global economy shrinking by 4.3 percent in 2020, affecting 130 million people who will starve as a result of the global economic crisis.

Strategic vaccine distribution plans have generally followed World Health Organization guidelines. In many European countries, priority has been given to the population based on multiple risk criteria related to age, work and health vulnerability. Guidelines do not usually provide prioritization criteria for the healthy, low-risk population under 60, who make up the vast majority of the workforce vital to economic recovery.

A new study by researchers at the IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca proposes a criterion for establishing a priority order for the administration of COVID-19 vaccines in the most advanced phase of the vaccination campaign when the elderly and vulnerable population has already been vaccinated. According to the researchers at the IMT School, the guiding principle should be that the following individuals who receive the vaccine should be essential workers, beneficiaries of wage guarantee schemes and workers at high unemployment risk. This would facilitate the return to work, the revival of the economy, and consequently a more efficient allocation of public resources and a reduction in future job losses.

The analysis conducted in the study was based on a dataset that integrates data on human mobility, excess mortality, worker leave, weather conditions and other economic variables. The causal impact of mobility restrictions and lockdowns was estimated using weather conditions as an exogenous source of variation.

The study shows that, with the restrictions imposed during the lockdown, a one percent drop in mobility implies a 0.6 percent drop in deaths in the following month. But on the other hand, a 1% decrease in human mobility corresponds to a 10% increase in the Wage Guarantee Fund (WGF) in the coming month. This effect is more pronounced during the initial lockdown and gradually diminishes from June with the easing of restrictions. The analysis then suggests that priority should be given to prioritizing vaccines for essential workers who are not eligible for remote work. This strategy would help increase mobility and thus help the economy and reduce the higher excess mortality.

There is also another aspect to consider: from July 2021, the EU Digital COVID Certificate Regulation will allow European citizens to obtain a COVID-19 certificate, which should in principle allow free movement between EU Member States. ease. Some European countries are introducing the COVID-19 certificate not only for travel purposes, but also as a requirement to enter indoor public spaces, attend events, access restaurants and even, as in the case of Italy, to enter safely. get to the workplace. In this spirit, Italy has already made the certificate mandatory for school and university staff and is now evaluating whether it will also become mandatory for other categories of public and private workers. As unvaccinated workers in more professional categories and countries may soon be affected by similar restrictions, the need to consider people’s employment status and unemployment risk when administering vaccine doses becomes even more relevant.

“The pros and cons of the lockdown policy are discussed in the literature. In this study, we provide solid evidence of the benefit of the Italian lockdown in reducing excess mortality. However, we also document the collateral damage of lockdowns in terms of unemployment risk. We conclude that future lockdowns should be avoided by prioritizing the vaccination of essential workers and people more exposed to unemployment risks among the healthy and active population,” said Massimo Riccaboni, professor of economics at the IMT School and author of the study. article.

Regarding the short availability of the vaccines and their optimal distribution, the results of the study are especially relevant for middle- and low-income countries, where the proportion of people fully vaccinated against COVID-19 is significantly lower than in countries with a high income, with percentages between 1 and 30 percent. Future research from the authors will be devoted to understanding how mobility patterns can influence employment risk and vaccination campaigns in other countries and in different sectors of the economy.

Reference: “COVID-19 Vaccination and Unemployment Risk: Lessons from the Italian Crisis” September 17, 2021, Scientific Reports.
DOI: 10.1038/s41598-021-97462-6