Today, in a market full of turbulence, business operations face unforeseen challenges. The most recent events, such as the global outbreak of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19), also known as the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak, have created a huge global crisis in "breaking many global supply chains" as China is commonly viewed as the "world factory." In fact, as reported by the World Economic Forum Global Risks Report (2020): "The global economy is facing an increased risk of stagnation, climate change is striking harder and more rapidly than expected, and fragmented cyberspace threatens the full potential of next-generation technologies." 1 Despite the fact that many sources of risks are uncontrollable by humans, we may be able to sense and respond quickly with the use of data and establish a resilient supply chain system. This is especially critical to humanitarian operations (Ataseven, Nair, & Ferguson, 2018), which respond to disaster and other risks (Apte, Khawam, Regnier, & Simon, 2016). Thanks to the explosive expansion and advances of digital technologies, such as smart mobile phones, social media platforms, e-commerce, and so on, data are around in every organization. As the analytics capabilities of organizations develop rapidly, artificial intelligence tools, big data analytics, blockchain, and so on are all tools available and being used in the industry. A natural question arises: in light of the highly volatile market environment and unpredictable global economic system, how should organizations, both profit making and nonprofit making ones,

Operational risk management (ORM) is critical for any organization, and in the big data era, analytical tools for operational risk management are evolving faster than ever. This paper examines recent developments in academic ORM literature from the data analytics perspective. We focus on identifying present trends in ORM related to various types of natural and man‐made disasters that have been challenging all aspects of life. Although we examine the broader operations management (OM) literature, we keep the focus on the articles published in the well‐regarded OM journals, including both empirical and analytical outlets. We highlight how the use of data analytics tools and methods have facilitated ORM. We discuss the need for data monitoring and the integration of various analytical tools into decision making processes by classifying the literature on application fields, analytics techniques, and the strategies used for implementation. We summarize our findings and propose a process to implement data‐driven ORM with future research directions.

In preparing for influenza pandemics, public health agencies stockpile critical medical resources. Determining appropriate quantities and locations for such resources can be challenging, given the considerable uncertainty in the timing and severity of future pandemics. We introduce a method for optimizing stockpiles of mechanical ventilators, which are critical for treating hospitalized influenza patients in respiratory failure. As a case study, we consider the US state of Texas during mild, moderate, and severe pandemics. Optimal allocations prioritize local over central storage, even though the latter can be deployed adaptively, on the basis of real-time needs. This prioritization stems from high geographic correlations and the slightly lower treatment success assumed for centrally stockpiled ventilators. We developed our model and analysis in collaboration with academic researchers and a state public health agency and incorporated it into a Web-based decision-support tool for pandemic preparedness and response.

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Background Around the globe, school closures were used sporadically to mitigate the 2009 H1N1 influenza pandemic. However, such closures can detrimentally impact economic and social life. Methods Here, we couple a decision analytic approach with a mathematical model of influenza transmission to estimate the impact of school closures in terms of epidemiological and cost effectiveness. Our method assumes that the transmissibility and the severity of the disease are uncertain, and evaluates several closure and reopening strategies that cover a range of thresholds in school-aged prevalence (SAP) and closure durations. Results Assuming a willingness to pay per quality adjusted life-year (QALY) threshold equal to the US per capita GDP ($46,000), we found that the cost effectiveness of these strategies is highly dependent on the severity and on a willingness to pay per QALY. For severe pandemics, the preferred strategy couples the earliest closure trigger (0.5% SAP) with the longest duration closure (24 weeks) considered. For milder pandemics, the preferred strategies also involve the earliest closure trigger, but are shorter duration (12 weeks for low transmission rates and variable length for high transmission rates). Conclusions These findings highlight the importance of obtaining early estimates of pandemic severity and provide guidance to public health decision-makers for effectively tailoring school closures strategies in response to a newly emergent influenza pandemic.

On 11 March 2020, the World Health Organisation (WHO) declared COVID-19 a pandemic. Early epidemiological estimates show that COVID-19 is highly transmissible, infecting populations across the globe in a short amount of time. WHO has recommended widespread clinical testing in order to contain COVID-19. However, mass testing in emergency department (ED) settings may result in crowded EDs and increase transmission risk for healthcare staff and other ED patients. Drive-through COVID-19 testing sites are an effective solution to quickly collect samples from suspected cases with minimal risk to healthcare personnel and other patients. Nevertheless, there are many logistical and operational challenges, such as shortages of testing kits, limited numbers of healthcare staff and long delays for collecting samples. Solving these problems requires an understanding of disease dynamics and epidemiology, as well as the logistics of mass distribution. In this position paper, we provide a conceptual framework for addressing these challenges, as well as some insights from prior literature and experience on developing decision support tools for public health departments. ARTICLE HISTORY

Pandemic influenza is an international public health concern. In light of the persistent threat of H5N1 avian influenza and the recent pandemic of A/H1N1swine influenza outbreak, public health agencies around the globe are continuously revising their preparedness plans. The A/H1N1 pandemic of 2009 demonstrated that influenza activity and severity might vary considerably among age groups and locations, and the distribution of an effective influenza vaccine may be significantly delayed and staggered. Thus, pandemic influenza vaccine distribution policies should be tailored to the demographic and spatial structures of communities. Here, we introduce a bi-criteria decision-making framework for vaccine distribution policies that is based on a geospatial and demographically-structured model of pandemic influenza transmission within and between counties of Arizona in the Unites States. Based on data from the 2009–2010 H1N1 pandemic, the policy predicted to reduce overall attack rate most effectively is prioritizing counties expected to experience the latest epidemic waves (a policy that may be politically untenable). However, when we consider reductions in both the attack rate and the waiting period for those seeking vaccines, the widely adopted pro rata policy (distributing according to population size) is also predicted to be an effective strategy.

Dispensing of mass prophylaxis can be critical to public health during emergency situations and involves complex decisions that must be made in a short period of time. This study presents a model and solution approach for optimizing point‐of‐dispensing (POD) location and capacity decisions. This approach is part of a decision support system designed to help officials prepare for and respond to public health emergencies. The model selects PODs from a candidate set and suggests how to staff each POD so that average travel and waiting times are minimized. A genetic algorithm (GA) quickly solves the problem based on travel and queuing approximations (QAs) and it has the ability to relax soft constraints when the dispensing goals cannot be met. We show that the proposed approach returns solutions comparable with other systems and it is able to evaluate alternative courses of action when the resources are not sufficient to meet the performance targets.