The impact of penalty and subsidy mechanisms on the decisions of the government, businesses, and consumers during COVID-19 ——Tripartite evolutionary game theory analysis

•High penalties for businesses and consumers can prompt the businesses and consumers to choose active prevention strategies no matter what the subsidy mechanism is.•For the government, the penalty mechanism is better than the subsidy mechanism, because the excessive subsidy mechanism will raise the government expenditure.•The punishment mechanism is more effective than the subsidy mechanism in realizing the tripartite joint prevention of the COVID-19. Therefore, the implementation of strict punishment mechanism should be a major government measure under COVID-19.