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Diabolical dilemmas of COVID-19: An empirical study into Dutch society’s trade-offs between health impacts and other effects of the lockdown

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  • Caspar Chorus
  • Erlend Dancke Sandorf
  • Niek Mouter

Abstract

We report and interpret preferences of a sample of the Dutch adult population for different strategies to end the so-called ‘intelligent lockdown’ which their government had put in place in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Using a discrete choice experiment, we invited participants to make a series of choices between policy scenarios aimed at relaxing the lockdown, which were specified not in terms of their nature (e.g. whether or not to allow schools to re-open) but in terms of their effects along seven dimensions. These included health-related effects, but also impacts on the economy, education, and personal income. From the observed choices, we were able to infer the implicit trade-offs made by the Dutch between these policy effects. For example, we find that the average citizen, in order to avoid one fatality directly or indirectly related to COVID-19, is willing to accept a lasting lag in the educational performance of 18 children, or a lasting (>3 years) and substantial (>15%) reduction in net income of 77 households. We explore heterogeneity across individuals in terms of these trade-offs by means of latent class analysis. Our results suggest that most citizens are willing to trade-off health-related and other effects of the lockdown, implying a consequentialist ethical perspective. Somewhat surprisingly, we find that the elderly, known to be at relatively high risk of being affected by the virus, are relatively reluctant to sacrifice economic pain and educational disadvantages for the younger generation, to avoid fatalities. We also identify a so-called taboo trade-off aversion amongst a substantial share of our sample, being an aversion to accept morally problematic policies that simultaneously imply higher fatality numbers and lower taxes. We explain various ways in which our results can be of value to policy makers in the context of the COVID-19 and future pandemics.

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  • Caspar Chorus & Erlend Dancke Sandorf & Niek Mouter, 2020. "Diabolical dilemmas of COVID-19: An empirical study into Dutch society’s trade-offs between health impacts and other effects of the lockdown," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 15(9), pages 1-19, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:plo:pone00:0238683
    DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0238683
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    Cited by:

    1. Arielle Kaim & Tuvia Gering & Amiram Moshaiov & Bruria Adini, 2021. "Deciphering the COVID-19 Health Economic Dilemma (HED): A Scoping Review," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(18), pages 1-13, September.
    2. Smeele, Nicholas V.R. & Chorus, Caspar G. & Schermer, Maartje H.N. & de Bekker-Grob, Esther W., 2023. "Towards machine learning for moral choice analysis in health economics: A literature review and research agenda," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 326(C).
    3. Chen, Chao & Feng, Tao & Gu, Xiaoning & Yao, Baozhen, 2022. "Investigating the effectiveness of COVID-19 pandemic countermeasures on the use of public transport: A case study of The Netherlands," Transport Policy, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 98-107.
    4. Llewellyn Ellardus Zyl, 2021. "Social Study Resources and Social Wellbeing Before and During the Intelligent COVID-19 Lockdown in The Netherlands," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 157(1), pages 393-415, August.
    5. Antonio Filippin & Marco Mantovani, 2024. "Moral Preferences over Health-Wealth Trade-offs," Working Papers 531, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics.
    6. Kathleen Manipis & Deborah Street & Paula Cronin & Rosalie Viney & Stephen Goodall, 2021. "Exploring the Trade-Off Between Economic and Health Outcomes During a Pandemic: A Discrete Choice Experiment of Lockdown Policies in Australia," The Patient: Patient-Centered Outcomes Research, Springer;International Academy of Health Preference Research, vol. 14(3), pages 359-371, May.
    7. Emily Lancsar & Elisabeth Huynh & Joffre Swait & Robert Breunig & Craig Mitton & Martyn Kirk & Cam Donaldson, 2023. "Preparing for future pandemics: A multi‐national comparison of health and economic trade‐offs," Health Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 32(7), pages 1434-1452, July.
    8. Haghani, Milad & Bliemer, Michiel C.J. & de Bekker-Grob, Esther W., 2022. "Applications of discrete choice experiments in COVID-19 research: Disparity in survey qualities between health and transport fields," Journal of choice modelling, Elsevier, vol. 44(C).

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    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • H00 - Public Economics - - General - - - General
    • I18 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Health - - - Government Policy; Regulation; Public Health
    • I38 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - Government Programs; Provision and Effects of Welfare Programs

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