Evidence of the Cost-Efficiency of Scale as seen in Polio Vaccination and Surveillance Costs

Abstract

This analysis examined how polio program costs vary with scale for vaccination and disease surveillance, based on historical budget data published by the Global Polio Eradication Initiative (GPEI) from 2005 to 2018. We applied a linear mixed effects regression model in order to understand the cost structure of the historical GPEI budgets, with the goal that lessons learned from polio may be extended to other global disease elimination programs. Our findings demonstrate that there are economies of scale for vaccine delivery operations and for disease surveillance, which means that larger programs can leverage fixed costs and achieve better cost-efficiency as they scale. This finding should enable decision makers to create more reliable budgets, which support fundraising and optimal resource allocation. They also provide insight into how cost effectiveness changes as programs scale up during progressive disease control and elimination, as well as what level of resources are needed to sustain a program that is scaling back post-eradication and through to certification.