Cost-benefit analysis is a very weak tool here, since costs are very hard to assess, long term, and uncertain, and in every individual case, it’s worth it because it’s a collective action problem and others are doing it wrong already.
There are estimates of the cost of antibiotic resistance, for example, almost $5b/year in the US alone. So from a collective action standpoint, if you assume that all agents are going to follow a policy, you at the very least only want to prescribe specific antibiotics when they are clinically useful—and even if you’re not running tests, etc. you need to know a really significant amount to know which antibiotics to use for which set of symptoms, and you should only prescribe them if there’s a pretty significant chance of full compliance. Hence the DOTS regime for TB—WHO guidelines require observing the patient taking each dose, not just prescribing it.
Cost-benefit analysis is a very weak tool here, since costs are very hard to assess, long term, and uncertain, and in every individual case, it’s worth it because it’s a collective action problem and others are doing it wrong already.
There are estimates of the cost of antibiotic resistance, for example, almost $5b/year in the US alone. So from a collective action standpoint, if you assume that all agents are going to follow a policy, you at the very least only want to prescribe specific antibiotics when they are clinically useful—and even if you’re not running tests, etc. you need to know a really significant amount to know which antibiotics to use for which set of symptoms, and you should only prescribe them if there’s a pretty significant chance of full compliance. Hence the DOTS regime for TB—WHO guidelines require observing the patient taking each dose, not just prescribing it.