Avalon Director Andrew Briggs, DPhil, addresses the issue of potential losses in quality-adjusted life years (QALYs) associated with COVID-19. Commentators have speculated as to the health burden of deaths associated with the virus. Anecdotal evidence suggests that death rates are higher with increasing age and that people with existing health conditions are particularly vulnerable. With this in mind, this short note and accompanying Excel tool seeks to identify simple to use and populate methodology to estimate likely QALY losses associated with premature death from COVID-19, based on standard life-table methods, conditioning on age and exploring the potential effect of comorbidities.
