Addressing the spatial disparity of COVID-19 vaccination services: A spatial optimisation approach

The COVID-19 pandemic has posed global public health threats. The mass COVID-19 vaccination has continuously played a central role in containing this pandemic. To maximise the benefits of COVID-19 vaccination, equal accessibility to vaccination at different spatial scales is critical. Limited research has investigated the spatial disparity and location optimisation of COVID-19 vaccination services. In this study, we utilised the spatial big data of COVID-19 vaccination sites and used the Gini index to measure the spatial disparity of COVID-19 vaccination service levels. Then, we leveraged spatial optimisation models to enhance the spatial deployment of vaccination sites in the study area of England, UK. The results demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed methods. Specifically, the spatial disparity of vaccination services is largely mitigated by the optimised configuration of vaccination sites, as the Gini index decreases from 0.84 (before optimisation) to 0.12 (after optimisation). The suggested vaccination sites would improve the equality of vaccination services and reduce the financial costs of maintaining the vaccination programme, which has implications for public health policymakers. This research illustrates that spatial optimisation could be instrumental in effectively addressing public health crises.