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Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

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Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#12
Great, so we just make sure there’s lots of testing being done so we can focus our efforts, and hugely expand our health care system to take care of that tiny 1% of the population. And we’ve got a whole week or two to do it. So why’s everyone so worked up about it?

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#14
"Our focus here isn’t treatments but numbers. You don’t need a special degree to understand what the data says and doesn’t say. Numbers are universal."

That's 180' from what I believe and have experienced repeatedly in industry settings. Transforming the numbers to meaningful data is always fundamental to success. For example here the number of cases confirmed is determined by the testing approach and process - you must know that to be able to make meaningful comparisons (there are many other aspects to epi data but that's just one).

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#15
post #10
post #8

Maybe it's not a good idea to upvote these layman ramblings and influencer opinions.

Do you wager that the majority of news circulating today is written by pandemic experts and medical professionals?

There are large number of government organizations, pandemic experts, medical professionals, and research groups communicating in the social media and blogs.

There is no reason to post news articles or blogs from random Joes in HN when you can post directly from experts.

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#16
This is an article written by a “growth hacker” who knows literally nothing about public health, claiming to explain public health to all of us.

This crap shouldn’t be on HN. This forum has become next to useless, slowly, then all at once in the last few weeks. I would assert that this community could do better, but at this point maybe it can’t.

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#17

This is bullshit. As but one example of the guy’s cluelessness: the curve of (new) infections over time is not a bell curve . The shape is roughly similar. But it has absolutely nothing to do with the normal distribution.

If that is your only criticism, you may be throwing away a whole article over a typo. The virus caseload in China is looking bell curve-ish. I am not on board with everything in this article, though. I am unsure about his proposition on reopening schools, for example. But I'm not throwing it all away over that one part.

Maybe you should because the fella has demonstrated sloppiness and ignorance on one issue, and that shakes my faith in the quality of the rest of it. If you are going to attempt to influence life and death policy you better be good. Compare the quality of this article to the Imperial College report last week.

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#19

Now is the time for extreme caution. We can laugh about how it was an overreaction later.

I’ve talked to a lot of folks in the past few weeks who aren’t laughing at all over what might be an overreaction. It’s making their lives very hard.

If it turns out this is indeed an overreaction, they’re going to be totally pissed off, and I’m probably going to agree with them. You’re free to laugh all you want, but it’s a privilege that you probably don’t appreciate.

Re: Evidence over Hysteria – Covid-19

#20
post #15
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you wager that the majority of news circulating today is written by pandemic experts and medical professionals?

There are large number of government organizations, pandemic experts, medical professionals, and research groups communicating in the social media and blogs. There is no reason to post news articles or blogs from random Joes in HN when you can post directly from experts.

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