Some priority formulas are also in conflict with each other or draw up such prescriptive rules that it hinders vaccinations, say public health experts. Yet many Americans may not be aware of the low algorithms that affect their access to vaccines.
Ellen P. Goodman, a professor at Rutgers Law School who studies how governments use automated decision-making systems, said algorithms are needed to allocate the vaccines effectively. But public agencies and health centers need to be transparent about the priority formulas, she added.
“We want to know who is using it, what they are trying to do, who owns their own algorithms, or is it being audited,” she said.
The formulas for prioritizing vaccines fall into approximately three levels: federal, state, and local. At the highest level, Operation Warp Speed - a federal multi-agency effort created by the Trump administration – managed nationwide distribution of vaccines through Tiberius, an online portal developed by the data mining giant Palantir. The administration of Biden, which ended the name of the program, took over and continued the effort.
To divide doses, federal administrators use a simple algorithm. It automatically divides the total amount of vaccinations available each week between the 50 states – as well as U.S. territories and some large cities like New York – based on the number of people over 18 in each location.
However, some health officials and researchers have described the Tiberius algorithm as a black box.
“Why can’t they disclose the methods they use to make these estimates?” says Dr. Rebecca Weintraub, an assistant professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School, who co-authored a recent study on state vaccination plans. “Why are the states receiving a different number of doses than they expected per week?”
States began warning last fall about the disadvantages of Tiberius. In interim vaccine plans submitted to the CDC, some state health administrators have complained that the platform looks too cumbersome and that the algorithm’s awards week-by-week make it difficult to plan month-long vaccination campaigns.