Covid tracing apps, and failure of rollout
Networks effects with Covid Contract tracing apps.
Contact tracking apps are used to help mitigate the spread of COVID-19. By logging data on who someone is in contact with, they make it easier and quicker to trace who a COVID positive may have come in contact with. Because most COVID apps require both parties of have the app in order to log as a contact, the more people who use it the more effective it is. This is means there is a network effect (relating to the course). The more people who use the app, the more useful it is to users as it is more useful in containing the spread of COVID.
Currently, contact tracing apps have no achieved widespread adoption within the United States. Each state is responsible for their on contact tracing app, and according to TIME magazine the state with the highest numbers of downloads per capita is Virginia. Where downloads of their contact tracing app equal around 10% of their adult population. However, many states have significantly less adoption, include download rates of around 1% in states like Wyoming. Even a 10% adoption rate like in Virginia is likely not enough, with likely 60% adoption needed to help reduce the spread of COVID.
While contact tracing apps are free, there are some costs and perceived costs to users. However, the main concern is the the perceived privacy issues around the app. Those proponents claim the Google – Apple standard used by most contact tracing apps preserves privacies, many in the public remain skeptical. In addition to privacy concerns, apps simply need to work against apathy, and convince the public to download the app.
The problems in the roll out contact tracing apps are a related to its role as a Networked good – contact tracing apps are most effective when they are on as many phones as possible. Therefore, it is important to get as many users on board as soon as possible. However, due to a delay in the roll out of contact tracing apps from mid-March (when COVID was a new part of our lives) to fall, attention has fallen away from these apps. Public Health authorities haven’t invested lots of money into advertising campaigns or incentives for using the app, nor is there a clear message from the federal government on the importance of these apps. Since there has not widespread adoption, there have not been many visible benefits of these apps, hurting their uptake. Since there are no visible benefits, there was not been an ‘upwards pressure’ in their adoption.
Its important for public health authorities to increase awareness of these apps to their networked benefits. They may also want to try other methods to get them on as many phones as possible, including getting employers to download them on work phones, as is being done in Italy. If they can get a critical mass of adoption, networked benefits may accrue and encourage more adoption.
https://time.com/5905772/covid-19-contact-tracing-apps/
https://hbr.org/2020/07/how-to-get-people-to-actually-use-contact-tracing-apps