Myrdal Prize 2023 goes to article on COVID-19 vaccination
The economists Mikael Elinder, Oscar Erixson and Mattias Öhman from Uppsala University win the Myrdal Prize 2023 for their article "Intelligence is linked to rapid vaccination against COVID-19, but it doesn't have to be!". The prize is awarded annually by Swedbank to recognise the best article of the year in the Swedish Economics Association's journal Ekonomisk Debatt.
The jury's motivation:
"The COVID-19 pandemic had a major impact on Sweden and caused a major economic downturn in the Swedish as well as the global economy. Although Sweden has come out of the pandemic relatively well in an international comparison, it is good to learn lessons that can reduce the costs to society of a possible future pandemic.
Mikael Elinder, Oscar Erixson and Mattias Öhman show that cognitive ability was an important factor in the decision to be vaccinated against COVID-19. Cognitive ability is not directly observable, but for men, results of completed mock tests can be used. These aim to measure logical, verbal and spatial abilities as well as technical understanding. The award-winning study shows that higher scores on these tests were associated with a significantly higher propensity to be vaccinated against COVID-19 - except in Uppsala. The Uppsala hospital region was the only hospital region in Sweden that sent out pre-booked vaccination appointments to those aged 50 and older. The results of the study show that pre-booked appointments were particularly effective in overcoming the difficulties of the vaccination decision for people with lower cognitive ability. The results indicate that if everyone had the same vaccination behaviour as people with high cognitive ability, the pandemic would likely have ended earlier, with fewer deaths and with lower costs to society.
The article is well written with a clear line and structure and provides a clear description of the data, methodology and results. The article has important policy implications and contributes in several ways to an informed and nuanced debate."