Project summary

Qally’s is a non-profit producing bespoke quantitative (e.g. cost-effectiveness) analyses for altruistic projects. We seek funding for a project quantifying the annual societal burden of airborne diseases in the US.

Much of the project has already been completed by Vivian Belenky and Richard Bruns. The last mile to MVP of this project — where Qally’s would come in — mostly involves quantifying the welfare costs of long COVID.

What are this project's goals and how can they be achieved?

The goal of the broadly-defined project (quantifying the annual societal burden of airborne diseases in the US) is to have a number that emphasizes to policymakers the enormous benefits of “never suffering from airborne disease (e.g. colds) again.” (Vivian and Richard see this message as more persuasive for policymakers than messages that emphasize pandemic risk reduction. Of course, including pandemic risk would only increase estimates of the burden of airborne disease.)

We hope that this number will help advocacy for investments in and deployment of technologies that improve indoor air quality (e.g. Far-UVC). Such technologies would contribute to defenses against pandemics far worse than the recent COVID-19 pandemic.

The burden of long COVID in particular is expected to be one of the most significant components of the overall burden of airborne diseases (alongside COVID loss of life, upper respiratory infections, and lower respiratory infections).

(Note that, to the best of Vivian and Richard’s knowledge, there do not exist estimates of the annual burden of airborne diseases in the US from after the COVID-19 pandemic.)

How will this funding be used?

Hours on this project will cost approximately $60 per hour. This will include wage costs and 20% organization overhead. The exact hourly rate will depend on how the work gets split between Joel and Aron. (See below.)

If we receive funding for 60 hours up to X>60 hours (~$3,600 to X * ~$60), then we will undertake the above project to the best of our ability within the time funded. If we receive funding for more hours than is needed to complete the project, we will either

1. Work on the next most important part of the burden of airborne disease project (this might mean building a Monte Carlo model, or researching a contribution to the burden other than long COVID, or helping write up results in a paper),

2. Write a public post about our findings, or

3. Not accept (or return) remaining funding,

depending on the judgment of Vivian Belenky and Richard Bruns.

Who is on the team and what's their track record on similar projects?

1. Joel Becker. Joel has recently created various cost-effectiveness analyses for AI safety and biosecurity organizations, and has been helping build Dendritic, a biosecurity operations center. Previously, Joel was an economics PhD student at NYU and a Predoctoral Fellow at Harvard.

2. Aron Lajko. Aron has a masters degree in Bioengineering from Imperial College London. This year he has supported Joel’s cost-effectiveness projects. Also, Aron has deep context on EA biosecurity.

What are the most likely causes and outcomes if this project fails? (premortem)

Possible causes of failure include:

1. Insufficient funding.

2. The question we are working on is too challenging to answer convincingly.

3. Any reasons why the larger burden of airborne disease project might fail.

   1. Estimates of the annual burden of airborne disease are not convincing to policymakers.

   2. Vivian Belenky, Richard Bruns, and Joel do not have time to write up results.

If the question is too challenging to answer convincingly, the project might exclude long COVID from calculations, moving forward with a significantly lower estimate for the burden of airborne disease.