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In April, more than 1,000 vaccine experts gathered in Washington for the first time since the pandemic began. Over four days, scientists, doctors and drugmakers pored over cutting-edge research and tackled some of the most pressing questions in the world of vaccines. Talk of Covid-19 vaccines was, of course, unavoidable. But high on the agenda at the World Vaccine Congress was a vaccine for another mysterious illness that could strike at any moment: Disease X. Disease X is not any particular virus, bacteria or other germ, but a term used as a stand-in for whatever pathogen will sweep the globe in the next pandemic. And there will indeed be a next pandemic, experts say. For the vaccine experts, one thing is clear: No matter the form Disease X takes, they'll be called on to get to work and develop the vaccine. Such a task could feel insurmountable, given the vast unknowns. Should they focus on particular viruses now to get a head start? Should they look at pathogens that so far are found only in animals, but could someday spill over into humans and cause widespread disease, like Covid did? Big and important questions, yes, but simple enough for this group of vaccine researchers and developers. They know the science. They understand how viruses evolve and spread. They know how to make safe and effective vaccines against them. But — as has become evident more than a year and a half into the U.S. vaccination campaign — one essential piece of information is missing: how to convince hesitant people to be vaccinated. "There's something about human behavior that we're still not really understanding," Dr. Nicole Lurie, U.S. director of the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, told the World Vaccine Congress. Since the first shots went into arms in December 2020, just over 66 percent of the U.S. population is now fully vaccinated, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. "There's all this emphasis on science and labs. It's one thing to do that, but it's a whole other thing to get what you develop in the lab into people's arms," said Richard Carpiano, a public health scientist who studies issues surrounding vaccine uptake at the University of California, Riverside. Scientists at the World Vaccine Congress acknowledged that, for all of their education and training, one issue has remained frustratingly hard to overcome: the growing anti-vaccine movement. U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy told NBC News that there is no doubt that vaccine misinformation is harming Americans, and could be detrimental in years to come. "It's certainly one of the issues we must address to prepare for the next pandemic, whenever that may come," he said. "This is absolutely critical from an emergency preparedness standpoint." If people are refusing vaccines in the face of an ongoing pandemic, widespread deaths will occur in future pandemics, warned Dr. Julie Morita, executive vice president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. "If we continue to have poor acceptance of vaccines, we will see millions of lives lost in the case of another pandemic as big as this one," she said. This will continue to haunt us. Dr. Peter Hotez, co-director of the Center for Vaccine Development at Texas Children's Hospital and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, addressed conference attendees, saying, "If you really want to save lives, it's not only about making vaccines." "We continue to underestimate what I call anti-vaccine, anti-science aggression," he said, adding that until it's met head-on, "this will continue to haunt us."

National and regional policymakers, patient and civil society organisations and advocacy groups must collaborate to ensure the importance of a life-course approach is prioritised, understood, shared and implemented. While some countries implement policies and programmes which embed different aspects of the life-course approach, these can be piecemeal rather than embedded within a framework to maximise health across the lifecourse. This must be addressed. Regional policymakers can play a critical role. In Europe, a Council Recommendation on Strengthened Cooperation Against Vaccine Preventable Diseases recognises the need for member states to take a life-course approach to vaccination for healthy living, healthy ageing and healthcare sustainability

The anti-science movement has set up the United States and the world up for a worse Covid-19 pandemic than otherwise would have been, infectious disease expert Dr. Peter Hotez argued Thursday.

“An anti-science disinformation campaign of unprecedented magnitude and led by both multinational corporations and some governments, especially the Russian and US Governments, fuels the pandemic,” Hotez, dean for the National School for Tropical Medicine at the Baylor College of Medicine, wrote in the journal Plos Biology.

In low-income countries, infectious diseases still account for a large proportion of deaths, highlighting health inequities largely caused by economic differences. Vaccination can cut health-care costs and reduce these inequities. Disease control, elimination or eradication can save billions of US dollars for communities and countries. Vaccines have lowered the incidence of hepatocellular carcinoma and will control cervical cancer. Travellers can be protected against “exotic” diseases by appropriate vaccination. Vaccines are considered indispensable against bioterrorism. They can combat resistance to antibiotics in some pathogens. Noncommunicable diseases, such as ischaemic heart disease, could also be reduced by influenza vaccination. Immunization programmes have improved the primary care infrastructure in developing countries, lowered mortality in childhood and empowered women to better plan their families, with consequent health, social and economic benefits. Vaccination helps economic growth everywhere, because of lower morbidity and mortality. The annual return on investment in vaccination has been calculated to be between 12% and 18%. Vaccination leads to increased life expectancy. Long healthy lives are now recognized as a prerequisite for wealth, and wealth promotes health. Vaccines are thus efficient tools to reduce disparities in wealth and inequities in health. Eradication Unless an environmental reservoir exists, an eradicated pathogen cannot re-emerge, unless accidentally or malevolently reintroduced by humans, allowing vaccination or other preventive measures to be discontinued. While eradication may be an ideal goal for an immunization programme, to date only smallpox has been eradicated, allowing discontinuation of routine smallpox immunization globally. Potentially, other infectious diseases with no extrahuman reservoir can be eradicated provided an effective vaccine and specific diagnostic tests are available. Eradication requires high levels of population immunity in all regions of the world over a prolonged period with adequate surveillance in place.9 The next disease targeted for eradication is polio, which is still a global challenge.10 Although high coverage with oral polio vaccine (OPV) has eliminated type 2 poliovirus globally, transmission of types 1 and 3 continues in limited areas in a few countries. OPV-caused paralytic disease, directly or by reversion to virulence, and persistent vaccine-virus excretion in immunodeficient individuals are problems yet to be solved. Global use of monovalent type 1 and type 3 OPV and inactivated polio vaccine (IPV) may eventually be required.10 Elimination Diseases can be eliminated locally without global eradication of the causative microorganism. In four of six WHO regions, substantial progress has been made in measles elimination; transmission no longer occurs indigenously and importation does not result in sustained spread of the virus.11 Key to this achievement is more than 95% population immunity through a two-dose vaccination regimen. Combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) vaccine could also eliminate and eventually eradicate rubella and mumps.11 Increasing measles immunization levels in Africa, where coverage averaged only 67% in 2004, is essential for eradication of this disease. Already, elimination of measles from the Americas, and of measles, mumps and rubella in Finland has been achieved, providing proof in principle of the feasibility of their ultimate global eradication.12 It may also be possible to eliminate Haemophilus influenzae type b (Hib) disease through well implemented national programmes, as experience in the West has shown.13 Local elimination does not remove the danger of reintroduction, such as in Botswana, polio-free since 1991, with importation of type 1 poliovirus from Nigeria in 2004,14 and in the United States of America (USA) with measles reintroduced to Indiana in 2005 by a traveller from Romania.15 For diseases with an environmental reservoir such as tetanus, or animal reservoirs such as Japanese encephalitis and rabies, eradication may not be possible, but global disease elimination is a feasible objective if vaccination of humans (and animals for rabies) is maintained at high levels. Control of mortality, morbidity and complications For the individual Efficacious vaccines protect individuals if administered before exposure. Pre-exposure vaccination of infants with several antigens is the cornerstone of successful immunization programmes against a cluster of childhood diseases. Vaccine efficacy against invasive Hib disease of more than 90% was demonstrated in European, Native American, Chilean and African children in large clinical studies in the 1990s.13 In the United Kingdom, no infant given three doses developed Hib disease in the short-term (boosters may be required for long-term protection), and recent postmarketing studies have confirmed the high effectiveness of vaccination of infants against Hib in Germany and pertussis in Sweden.13,16,17 Many vaccines can also protect when administered after exposure – examples are rabies, hepatitis B, hepatitis A, measles and varicella.18 For society Ehreth estimates that vaccines annually prevent almost 6 million deaths worldwide.19 In the USA, there has been a 99% decrease in incidence for the nine diseases for which vaccines have been recommended for decades,20 accompanied by a similar decline in mortality and disease sequelae. Complications such as congenital rubella syndrome, liver cirrhosis and cancer caused by chronic hepatitis B infection or neurological lesions secondary to measles or mumps can have a greater long-term impact than the acute disease. Up to 40% of children who survive meningitis due to Hib may have life-long neurological defects.13 In field trials, mortality and morbidity reductions were seen for pneumococcal disease in sub-Saharan Africa and rotavirus in Latin America.21,22 Specific vaccines have also been used to protect those in greatest need of protection against infectious diseases, such as pregnant women, cancer patients and the immunocompromised.

Consider, for example, the case of compulsory vaccination. Compulsory immunization relies on the threat of sanctions to motivate a desired behavior. For instance, states might withhold school entrance or restrict place of residence for those who fail to comply. This kind of policy has met with great success in eradicating several diseases. Some comparative studies show that compulsory immunization programs have reduced vaccine-preventable diseases by 98-99% in many developed countries (Salmon et al., 2006). Other things being equal, the possibility of administering vaccines on a voluntary basis can increase the risk of multiple diseases that could be controlled under a compulsory scheme. Even though there are anti-vaccination movements, it seems difficult to make the case that all vaccines should be administrated on a voluntary basis, since the costs in terms of individual freedom are relatively low and the benefits each individual receives by living in a healthy society relatively high.

The worldwide COVID-19 epidemic will not be contained in the near future. Increasingly contagious variants of SARSCoV-2 are already prevalent throughout the United States, and still other potent variants will continue to emerge.[1-3] Even though two-thirds of the U.S. adult population has received at least one vaccine dose, vaccination rates remain highly variable across and within states.[4-6] Cumulative vaccination rates will continue to level off as the supply of vaccines begins to surpass remaining demand.[7] After declining precipitously, the incidence of new COVID-19 cases has now plateaued and even increased in some states.[8] The risks for unvaccinated people appear to be increasing,[9] and new outbreaks continue to be reported.[10, 11]

Under these conditions, the foreseeable risk of an outbreak at a college campus with in-person learning or a worksite with on-site employees remains ever-present and substantial. Such an outbreak would prove disastrous for an educational institution or a business firm, and could have significant negative spillover effects on surrounding communities.[12] When it comes to hospitals, clinics, long-term-care facilities and other healthcare providers, the risk that an infected employee, patient or visitor could in turn cause an outbreak among vulnerable patients is simply too great to bear.

The consequences of the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic have been far-reaching, particularly among health care personnel (HCP) and within health care settings. HCP have been directly affected, sustaining occupationally acquired COVID-19 infections, and indirectly through a substantial alteration in health care delivery. With the advent of highly effective and safe SARS-CoV-2 vaccines, case rates and hospitalization rates are declining, and the promise of a return to some semblance of pre–COVID-19 health care is growing. Recently, several medical centers have announced a requirement for SARS-CoV-2 vaccination of all HCP (allowing for medical and religious exemptions), and the impending licensure of the mRNA SARS-CoV-2 vaccines (following the previous Emergency Use Authorization [EUA]) will move many other centers to consider a similar policy. A recent outbreak in a skilled nursing facility attributed to an unvaccinated HCP member clearly illustrates the risk unvaccinated HCP can pose to their patients and other HCP.1

The recognition of HCP vaccination as an essential component of patient and HCP safety programs emerged in the mid-2000s with a focus on influenza vaccination. Prior to the 2009-2010 influenza season, despite increased awareness of the importance of HCP influenza vaccination and large-scale, resource-intensive voluntary vaccination campaigns, vaccination rates remained very low. While HCP influenza vaccination was first recommended by the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices in 1978, innovative, patient safety–focused programs at hospitals like Virginia Mason Medical Center paved the way for stronger expectations surrounding HCP vaccination.2 The success at these institutions, professional society endorsements of influenza vaccination as a condition of employment policies, and the addition of HCP influenza vaccination as a publicly reported quality measure were associated with increases in vaccination rates from around 45% to nearly 80%, with higher rates among acute care facilities, physicians, and nursing personnel.3 During the 2019-2020 season, the percentage of hospital-based HCP who reported working under an employer influenza vaccination requirement reached 72.1%.3 Very few HCP have had their employment terminated due to policy refusal, particularly considering the thousands encompassed by these policies.

To increase the perceived benefits of vaccination, a growing number of governments have implemented conditional cash lotteries (CCLs) that offer opportunities to win large prizes only available to vaccinated individuals. A CCL incentive is promising in this context because of its targeted nature: people with a greater propensity to decline vaccination are also more likely to assign a higher expected value to a lottery, a behavioral phenomenon known as probability neglect. Our paper evaluates the first CCL for COVID-19 vaccinations, which Ohio implemented during May and June of 2021. We find that Ohio’s initiative significantly increases vaccinations—successfully encouraging more than 82,000 Ohioans who would otherwise not be vaccinated, an increase of 1.5 percent. Furthermore, we estimate that this surge in vaccinations then decreases COVID-19 prevalence within the state, reducing infections and ICU utilization by at least 1.3 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively.

These estimates allow us to assess the cost-effectiveness of the program. In a large study of COVID-19 patients, Di Fusco et al. (2021) find that the average hospital bill per day in the ICU is around 13,500 dollars. Using our estimate of the number of ICU patient-days averted, we calculate that the total benefit from avoiding these charges is approximately 66 million dollars. Additionally, there are substantial other social benefits from the 15,000 (or more) cases prevented, such as quality of life enrichment—especially for those who avoid cases of “long-haul COVID,” where symptoms persist for months or longer—and potentially lives saved. Given that the total cost of Ohio’s Vax-A-Million incentive scheme is 5.6 million dollars, the benefits of the CCL unquestionably exceed the program’s cost.

Both BI and CT experiments have demonstrated that people who receive transfers tend to behave in ways that improves their well-being, as we demonstrate. More children are educated for longer periods of time. Health improves, partly as a consequence of behaviours such as reducing risky behaviour and increasing vaccination rates. However, neither the BI movement nor the CT movement has developed a very convincing theory about how and why these programs improve well-being.

This essay draws an explicit parallel between BI and CTs, and investigates how these schemes achieve beneficial outcomes. Section 2 examines CT schemes, examining whether it is the condition or the cash which is responsible for beneficial outcomes. Section 3 discusses parallel findings from a Canadian social experiment known as MINCOME, demonstrating that CTs function in remarkably similar ways in high-income countries, to how they do in low- and middle-income countries. Section 4 attempts to explain how CTs work. Of the four theories discussed, three explicitly acknowledge the interdependence of society and are based, in increasingly complex ways, on ideas of social inclusion. Only if we have an understanding of how CTs affect decision-making can we address questions of how best to design CTs. Section 5 acknowledges gaps in our knowledge, and maps a way forward.

Conditional cash lotteries (CCLs) provide people with opportunities to win monetary prizes only if they make specific behavioral changes. We conduct a case study of Ohio's Vax-A-Million initiative, the first CCL targeting COVID-19 vaccinations. Forming a synthetic control from other states, we find that Ohios incentive scheme increases the vaccinated share of state population by 1.5 percent (0.7 pp), costing sixty-eight dollars per person persuaded to vaccinate. We show this causes significant reductions in COVID-19, preventing at least one infection for every six vaccinations that the lottery had successfully encouraged. These findings are promising for similar CCL public health initiatives.

Behavioral researchers and other scientists are closely watching, and in some cases helping set up, these financial incentives to see how well they work. Some early data on vaccine lotteries suggest they can’t persuade everyone, but they could convince some people teetering on the edge of committing to a shot. “Incentives of various different types, including lotteries, may be one effective strategy,” says Dena Gromet, a psychologist at the University of Pennsylvania who helped set up Philadelphia’s vaccination lottery, which had a grand prize of $50,000. “But we are likely going to have to rely on a multiprong approach to be able to really make a dent in vaccination going forward.” Directly giving Americans money to get a vaccine hasn’t been tested before, but studies in Africa and Latin America have shown cash payments prod individuals to make use of health services, including pediatrician visits, nutrition consultations, and educational sessions, according to Amanda Glassman, a public health expert at the Center for Global Development. One study, conducted in Nigeria, found that conditional cash transfers increased childhood measles vaccination rates by 27%.∂ Although there are few studies of the effectiveness of lotteries as a medical incentive, some economists suggest they could appeal to the type of people who are hesitant to get vaccinated for COVID-19. Those who have not been vaccinated are more likely to tolerate risk, they suggest, meaning the hesitant might be more receptive to a lottery than the population at large. A lottery could also capitalize on a phenomenon called “probability neglect,” where individuals will irrationally interpret probabilities in their favor.∂ “Certain people just underestimate, say, the risks of a disease like COVID-19 for themselves, or spreading it to others, and also simultaneously would overweight, or be overoptimistic about their odds of winning the lottery,” says economist Jeremy West of the University of California (UC), Santa Cruz, who is a co-author of a recently posted working paper about Ohio’s vaccine lottery.∂ A lottery may also be more cost-effective than direct cash payments. West and his colleagues calculated that Ohio’s $5.6 million lottery has enticed 80,000 residents to get vaccinated—a figure they arrived at by comparing the state’s actual vaccination data with a simulation incorporating rates for demographically similar states that did not implement a lottery. That amounted to $68 for each new person vaccinated—a bargain compared with a $100 payment.∂ West also estimates that the lottery payout saved Ohio $66 million in intensive care unit costs. “Meaning, it’s a no-brainer to do. But it’s also not going to be the cure-all for the pandemic, or for vaccination hesitancy,” West says. Three other recent analyses of the Ohio lottery have come to similar conclusions, with estimates of extra vaccinations produced ranging from no significant change to 100,000.∂ Glassman suspects guaranteed, direct payments like those given by New York City—in the form of a prepaid debit card—could also move the needle. Although COVID-19 vaccines are free to everyone in the United States, many people face indirect costs, from transportation fees to a vaccine provider to taking time off from work for the shot or subsequent side effects. These potential expenses, particularly for those who are young or at lower risk for severe disease, may be enough to put off vaccinations.∂ The country “moved through that first set of people who were online everyday clicking for appointments, spending lots and lots of time, bearing lots of cost to figure out how to get these vaccines, to a group of people who … weren’t willing to do it,” says political scientist Lynn Vavreck of UC Los Angeles.∂ Direct financial payouts or lotteries could more effectively change the cost-benefit calculation to those that are holding out on vaccination, she and others suggest. “The lotteries aren’t really about changing beliefs. They are intended to increase the perceived benefit of receiving the vaccine and motivate indecisive people to go get the shot. It’s a strength in that it’s low cost and voluntary,” adds Oberlin College economist Maggie Brehm, who is a co-author of another study of Ohio’s vaccine lottery. But Vavreck notes that cash incentives can only go so far. “We are not trying to get everyone—we are trying to get the people on the margin, the next set of people who can imagine themselves [getting vaccinated] under some circumstance,” she says.∂ Cash may better sway those who have not been moved by a year of public health information and personal vaccination anecdotes, Vavreck suggests. Oxiris Barbot, former health commissioner of New York City, does not think this is the case in the city—particularly in low-income neighborhoods and communities of color.∂ “It would make more sense to pay [people] to stay home if they had been exposed to COVID, to acknowledge the challenge that some people have in terms of housing security, food insecurity, et cetera—versus spending that money paying people to do something that they should already be doing,” she says.

Widespread hesitance toward COVID-19 vaccines has the potential to create a gap between the actual vaccination rate and the rate needed to achieve herd immunity. This research investigates the extent to which coupled financial incentives (conditional cash transfers) would help bridge this gap. We find that financial incentives between $1000 and $2000 to receive the vaccine yields an 8-percentage-point increase in uptake relative to baseline. The size of the cash transfer in this range does not dramatically affect uptake rates. However, incentive responses differ dramatically by demographic group. Republicans were less responsive to financial incentives than the general population. For Black and Latino Americans especially, very large financial incentives appear to be counter-productive. We caution that, as an online survey experiment, our study has limitations. Our sample was constructed to be representative of the United States adult population on certain demographics, but excludes adults outside the United States. Even within the United States the sample may exclude some populations, such as those lacking internet access.

We measured self-reported vaccine intentions at one point in time, not actual behaviors in the future. We expect the overall willingness to take the vaccine to change over time, but the marginal effects of incentive may remain more constant. Survey responses are subject to biases, including social desirability, but the anonymous between-subject design helps. And, it is not clear that such biases would interact with and confound our manipulations. We tested a relatively large range of incentives, but further research could explore lower or higher payments, as well as explore framing effects and baseline effects. People may respond differently to receiving a conditional cash transfer (as in our experiment) or refundable tax credit for getting vaccinated versus a fine or civil penalty for not getting vaccinated, even if the economic impact is the same. Another frame is the mere compensation for the time and inconvenience of getting the vaccine (reducing hassle costs to net zero), which some employers are reportedly using. Although we examined demographic covariates, our sample was limited to explore subgroup effects. We also did not measure other attitudes or beliefs, which could moderate the observed outcomes. Our study cannot say whether the offer of payment changes beliefs about the vaccine’s safety or efficacy, for example.

We report the first AIR data analysis to evaluate changes in catchup vaccination of children and adolescents in Australia after the introduction of the “No jab, no pay” policy. We found substantial catch-up vaccination activity among children against selected vaccine-preventable diseases after the implementation of this policy. Catch-up DTPa3 vaccination activity was 65% higher during the first two years of “No jab, no pay” than during the baseline period (15.5% v 9.4%). In the two years immediately following its introduction, people aged 7 to less than 20 years received nearly 87 000 catch-up MMR2 doses and about 31 500 catch-up DTPa3/ dTpa3 doses. The marked mid-year peaks in catch-up vaccination activity in 2016 and 2017 suggest a link with “No jab, no pay”, as vaccination requirements for all relevant family assistance payments were assessed at the end of each financial year (July; but fortnightly for Child Care Subsidy since 1 July 2018). The lower level of peak catch-up activity in 2017 than in 2016 suggests that the major impact of the new policy was in its initial year.

We found that MMR2 catch-up vaccination increased coverage among people aged 10 to less than 20 years from 86.6% in 2015 to 89.0% to 2017; this was an important increase, although to a level still below the 95% coverage across all age groups needed to prevent the spread of measles. A considerable proportion of cases in the largest recent measles outbreak in Australia (Sydney, 2012) were in this age group (49 of 168, 29%).19 While endemic measles has been eliminated in Australia, outbreaks linked to imported disease still occur. Maximising MMR vaccination coverage across all age groups is important for maintaining elimination, particularly given the large increases in measles case numbers in many countries during 2018–19.20

The national 'No Jab No Pay' policy has seen an increase in catch-up vaccination rates, with some of the biggest changes in the lowest socio-economic status areas and for Indigenous Australians, finds new research led by Sydney researchers.

The national ‘No Jab, No Pay’ policy has been associated with substantial catch-up vaccination activity in lower socio-economic status areas in Australia, according to research published today by the Medical Journal of Australia.

Jonna Mazet: If you have the community with you and willing to mask and vaccinate and all of those things, you can have much better outcomes than many places where there was no pre-communication, no pre-planning, no pre-establishment of trust.

William Hanage: It’s kind of Pandemic 101, that you maintain confidence from the public, and trust in the information that they’re getting, and you have to earn that trust. It’s not something which you can take for granted. Now, what actually happened in the United States and other places — but the United States, in particular — is that that information became suddenly political. Whether or not you thought the virus was a problem became a badge of identity rather than a matter of scientific fact. And the people who have been trying to supply that information, they ended up being subjects of misinformation, basically — and misinformation which is still going on. I think that the social media companies, the Facebooks and the Twitters of the world, they bear a strong degree of responsibility for that kind of thing. And, as I keep saying, it’s not over yet.

The recent outbreaks of vaccine-preventable diseases have refocused attention on the threat posed by unvaccinated and undervaccinated individuals.1 Governments around the world have responded by strengthening laws and policies directed at increasing vaccination rates. The standard menu of options includes education and information initiatives, incentives, and mandates; these may be directed at the general public, health care organizations, or practitioners.

The term mandate is somewhat misleading, because there are exceptions —always on medical grounds, frequently on religious grounds, and sometimes on philosophical grounds. Moreover, the thrust of mandates is not to forcibly require vaccination but to predicate eligibility for a service or benefit on adherence to the recommended immunization schedule of vaccination. In the United States, every state requires proof of immunization for entry into public schools, and some states also have similar requirements for entry into daycare facilities and private schools. These requirements can seem coercive to families who do not have other feasible schooling or child care options. However, the logic and acceptability of these requirements are rooted in the fact that the risks posed by clusters of nonimmunized children are heightened in these very settings.

everyone pronoun ev·​ery·​one ˈev-rē-(ˌ)wən every person: EVERYBODY Everyone laughed at her joke. Not everyone finished their meal.

Britannica Dictionary definition of ALL 1: the whole, entire, total amount, quantity, or extent of He stayed awake all night. [=the whole/entire night] She worked hard all day. [=throughout the entire day] I've been waiting all week to see her. [+] more examples 2 a: every member or part of — used with a plural noun or pronoun to mean that a statement is true of every person or thing in a group All my friends were there. a film suitable for all ages They all came late. [+] more examples b: the whole number or sum of — used with a plural noun or pronoun to mean that a statement is true of a group of people or things considered together It was great to see him again after all these years.

As mentioned above, this type of definition seems particularly common in Canada, where the idea has enjoyed a long history, where an experiment in Manitoba in the late 1970s became one of the most famous trials of a negative income tax–or what many Canadians politicians, academics, and journalists would call a ‘basic income’.

For example, on a page titled “About Basic Income”, BIEN’s Canadian affiliate, Basic Income Canada Network, defines ‘basic income guarantee’ (which seems to be used synonymously with ‘basic income’) as a program that “ensures everyone an income sufficient to meet basic needs and live with dignity, regardless of work status” [3] [4]. Similarly, the Government of Ontario, which has recently launched a new experiment of what it calls a ‘basic income’, defines the term as “a payment to eligible families or individuals that ensures a minimum income level, regardless of employment status” [5].

One of the key elements of basic income programs is that they are, for the most part, unconditional. There may be a few minor conditions attached, such as residency, age or non-incarceration.