On Allocating Scarce Resources “Fairly”

Maybe there is a lesson to be learned for HPC from common practices in medicine. The lack of organs that can be transplanted creates several ethical dilemmas without a truly satisfying resolution. Still, there are a few interesting strategies that have been developed to make organ distribution fairer.

The most common key tools in this context are organ allocation scores . There is, however, no single best allocation score, instead, there are various competing scores with different benefits and drawbacks. Many of these scores, however, are constructed in such a way that they attempt to maximize lifetime gained after transplantation, thus the younger and healthier the higher the chances to get the highest quality organ donation.

Similar strategies may as well become relevant in HPC contexts when it comes to prioritizing computation in the context of disaster response or medical computations on HPC resources.