COVID 19 prisoner’s dilemma
The linked resource below is an article about how a prisoner’s dilemma could be applied to decision making processes during COVID-19 pandemic. The author describes a two player game where the players are governors of California and Arizona. Both California and Arizona incur great business losses from social-distancing and quarantine. Gavin Newsom (California) and Doug Ducey (Arizona) should decide whether to open their economics, despite the COVID-19 pandemic, or not. If both governors choose to reopen their economies, it would increase the spread of the virus and would increase the number of deaths. If only California would continue a shelter-in-place-order, then the penalty would be different. The penalty for California is now greater because California not only incur business losses but also the increased transmissions of the virus due to Arizona’s choice to reopen its economy. Considering these penalties, neither California nor Arizona would continue the lockdown. Both governors would want to deviate from the shelter-in-place order and have the other governor to continue the lockdown. This is called the Nash equilibrium. However, California and Arizona would end up with a better outcome if they could cooperate and devise a response to reopening with an aim to minimize the transmission of the virus and maximize business survival.
The author also explains how prisoner’s dilemma could be applied to decisions made by business owners. If a local business stays closed, it loses money and might go bankrupt. If a local business reopens, it will make money and take a market share from other market competitors who decided to stay closed. However, if everyone reopens, local businesses will increase the transmission of the virus and would not benefit from a competitive market.
The same logic could be applied to people deciding whether to wear a face covering or not. Recent studies suggest that wearing face masks reduces the transmission of COVID-19. Although there is still a chance to get infected, the mask significantly reduces this risk. Thus, if some people decide not to wear masks, they also negatively affect people who prefer to wear face covering.
Even though the exact penalties in such games are unknown due to several unknown variables, the author suggests that if we at least cooperate at such a difficult time for everyone, we can minimize the massive losses due to the lack of coordination.
Reference: https://www.stanforddaily.com/2020/06/21/a-covid-19-prisoners-dilemma/