Incentivized Peer Referrals for Tuberculosis Screening: Evidence from India
通过印度122个结核病治疗中心的实验，研究发现小额经济激励能提高现有患者转介潜在筛查者的概率，从而以低成本有效发现新病例。
We study whether and how peer referrals increase screening, testing, and identification of patients with tuberculosis, an infectious disease responsible for over one million deaths annually. In an experiment with 3,176 patients at 122 tuberculosis treatment centers in India, we find that small financial incentives raise the probability that existing patients refer prospective patients for screening and testing, resulting in cost-effective identification of new cases. Incentivized referrals operate through two mechanisms: peers have private information about individuals in their social networks to target for outreach, and they are more effective than health workers in inducing these individuals to get tested.