Those familiar with game theory have probably heard about the prisoner’s dilemma. In it, two convicts who cannot communicate with each other are interviewed by the authorities. If both of them cooperate and keep their mouths shut, they will receive a short sentence. If both speak against each other, both will be convicted for life. If one speaks and the other keeps schtum, however, the silent partner receives a life sentence while the snitch is set free.
 
In essence, the prisoner’s dilemma is a situation in which there is an incentive for individuals to make a choice that does not produce the optimal result for the group.
 
Policymakers may have this quandary in mind when designing exit strategies from the Covid pandemic. Rampant unemployment has health costs too, and this reality has already been reflected in some countries’ exit strategies, as they shift to relying more on face coverings while loosening social distancing measures. Doing so will help the economy to stutter back into life again, but it also brings some conundrums.
 
Rather than protecting the wearer, peer-reviewed studies have shown that face coverings reduce infection rates by decreasing the rate of infection from the users to others in their close vicinity. The larger the share of the population that uses face masks, therefore, the greater the impact that this will have on the overall infection rate.
 
But just as in the prisoner’s dilemma, people will have an individual incentive to cheat. If most people are already wearing face coverings, why do I need to bother using one?
 
In this case, official guidance may not be enough to compel people to do something that makes them uncomfortable or that they feel impinges upon their liberty. With the pressure to ease distancing and open the economy increasing every day, governments may feel it increasingly necessary to make the use of face coverings mandatory in certain public places, as is now the case on all public transport in England.