Optimal allocation strategies for prioritized geographical vaccination for Covid-19

Abstract

While SARS-CoV-2 vaccine distribution campaigns are underway across the world communities, these efforts face the challenge of effective distribution of limited supplies. We wonder whether suitable spatial allocation strategies might significantly improve a campaignfls efficacy in averting damaging outcomes. In the context of a limited and intermittent COVID-19 supply, we investigate spatial prioritization strategies based on six metrics using the SLIR compartmental epidemic model. We found that the strategy based on the prevalence of susceptible individuals is optimal especially in early interventions and for intermediate values of vaccination rate. It minimizes the cumulative incidence and consequently averts most infections. Our results suggest also that a better performance is obtained if the single batch allocation is supplemented with one or more updating of the priority list. Moreover, the splitting of supply in two or more batches may significantly improve the optimality of the operation.