COVID-19 in a social reinsurance framework: Forewarned is forearmed

The crisis caused by COVID-19 revealed the global unpreparedness to handle the impact of a pandemic. In this paper, we present a statistical analysis of the data related to the COVID-19 outbreak in China, specifically the infection speed, death and fatality rates in Hubei province. By fitting distributions of these quantities we design a parametric reinsurance contract whose trigger and cap are based on the probability distributions of the infection speed, death and fatality rates. In particular, fitting the distribution for the infection speed and death rates we provide a measure of the effectiveness of a state's action during an epidemic, and propose a reinsurance contract as a supplement to a state's social insurance to alleviate financial costs.