More from the Author

• Article | Bloomberg Opinion

  How to End the Plasma Shortage for Coronavirus Patients

  Scott Duke Kominers

  Those who have recovered from the virus will donate more blood if given the right incentives.

  Citation:

  Kominers, Scott Duke. "How to End the Plasma Shortage for Coronavirus Patients." Bloomberg Opinion (May 11, 2020).  View Details

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• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2020

  Paying It Backward and Forward: Expanding Access to Convalescent Plasma Therapy Through Market Design

  Scott Duke Kominers, Parag A. Pathak, Tayfun Sönmez and M. Utku Ünver

  COVID-19 convalescent plasma (CCP) therapy is currently a leading treatment for COVID-19. At present, there is a shortage of CCP relative to demand. We develop and analyze a model of centralized CCP allocation that incorporates both donation and distribution. In order to increase CCP supply, we introduce a mechanism that utilizes two incentive schemes, respectively based on principles of “paying it backward" and “paying it forward." Under the first scheme, CCP donors obtain treatment vouchers that can be transferred to patients of their choosing. Under the latter scheme, patients obtain priority for CCP therapy in exchange for a future pledge to donate CCP if possible. We show that in steady-state, both principles generally increase overall treatment rates for all patients—not just those who are voucher-prioritized or pledged to donate. Our results also hold under certain conditions if a fraction of CCP is reserved for patients who participate in clinical trials. Finally, we examine the implications of pooling blood types on the efficiency and equity of CCP distribution.

  Keywords: COVID-19; convalescent plasma; vouchers; Health Pandemics; Health Care and Treatment; Resource Allocation; Market Design;

  Citation:

  Kominers, Scott Duke, Parag A. Pathak, Tayfun Sönmez, and M. Utku Ünver. "Paying It Backward and Forward: Expanding Access to Convalescent Plasma Therapy Through Market Design." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 20-116, May 2020.  View Details

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• Article | Journal de Théorie des Nombres de Bordeaux | 2019

  Configurations of Extremal Type II Codes via Harmonic Weight Enumerators

  Noam D. Elkies and Scott Duke Kominers

  We prove configuration results for extremal Type II codes, analogous to the configuration results of Ozeki and of the second author for extremal Type II lattices. Specifically, we show that for n ∈{8,24,32,48,56,72,96} every extremal Type II code of length n is generated by its codewords of minimal weight. Where Ozeki and Kominers used spherical harmonics and weighted theta functions, we use discrete harmonic polynomials and harmonic weight enumerators. Along the way we introduce "t12-designs" as a discrete analog of Venkov's spherical designs of the same name.

  Keywords: Mathematical Methods;

  Citation:

  Elkies, Noam D., and Scott Duke Kominers. "Configurations of Extremal Type II Codes via Harmonic Weight Enumerators." Journal de Théorie des Nombres de Bordeaux 31, no. 3 (2019): 679–688.  View Details

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