Multiregional Dynamic Vaccine Allocation During an Influenza Epidemic

We consider a sequential decision problem in national health policy: the weekly deployments of limited influenza vaccine doses, as they become available, to the various geographical regions of the United States during a pandemic event. As with the 2009 H1N1 pandemic flu, we assume that the progression of flu infection varies from region to region, with some regions starting their flu waves weeks before others. We also assume that vaccine doses only become available after flu waves have already started in some regions. Whereas the traditional deployment of vaccines is in direct proportion to resident population, without regard to flu status in any region, we show that a new policy that dynamically considers the status of the various regional flu waves can dramatically reduce the incidence of flu infection over the entire country. The method uses mathematical models of flu spread and requires capturing real-time data on flu incidence.

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