Understanding the Risk of an Avian Flu Pandemic: Rational Waiting or Precautionary Failure?

• Published in: Risk Analysis
• Main Authors: Basili, Marcello, Franzini, Maurizio
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Wiley 2006
• Subjects: Avian flu
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2006.00761.x; https://api.wiley.com/onlinelibrary/tdm/v1/articles/10.1111%2Fj.1539-6924.2006.00761.x; https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/j.1539-6924.2006.00761.x

The precautionary principle (PP) has been proposed as the proper guide for the decision‐making criteria to be adopted in the face of the new catastrophic risks that have arisen in the last decades. This article puts forward a workable definition of the PP based on the so‐called α‐maximin expected utility approach, applying it to the possible outbreak of the avian flu disease among humans. Moreover, it shows how the shortage and/or lack of effective drugs against the infection of the virus A(H5N1) among humans can be considered a precautionary failure.