Limitless Applications- How Game Theory can prevent Disease Outbreaks
-https://theconversation.com/game-theory-can-help-prevent-disease-outbreaks-102934
-Perhaps one of the most troubling issues in today’s society revolves around something that has been foreshadowed as early as H.G. Well’s book in 1897 The War of the Worlds: the potency of diseases. Throughout the 21st century, the rise of diseases and the outbreaks has had a notable effect with extreme cases like Ebola back in 2013 to 2016, and the evolution of superbugs. People often attribute medicinal efforts to be the key to “curing” these diseases (although “hold off” would be a better way to put it), so it would be surprising to hear that a topic studied heavily in economics can prevent such outbreaks.
-As Eva Cornejo Coba explains in her article, what’s best for us as individuals may not always be the best thing for the population and vice versa. The difficulty in deciding which is best can be predicted better through game theory. For example, in the case of outbreaks, Coba explains that what determines the outcome of an outbreak is the interaction between individuals involved and how risk is perceived to those individuals and to the group as a whole.
-The topic of game theory was explored very in depth in networks. Whether it be the prisoner’s dilemma, the best area for a kicker to kick or a goalie to dive, game theory can be applied to all these situations and newfound decisions as to what is the actual best course of action can be determined. For any application found in any economics class and not just in networks, it’s surprising how those applications can be used outside of the classroom to solve problems on even a global scale.