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Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

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Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#51

Post by mikeyouse »

tobyjsullivan wrote: post #36
Klinky wrote: post #6

Is this paper basically saying China and Italy's troubles with COVID-19 "ain't no big deal", and that New York and Washington are not struggling? >"Leaving the well-known and highly lethal SARS and MERS coronaviruses aside, other coronaviruses probably have infected millions of people and have killed thousands" This is not cited, and seems like potentially exaggerated non-evidence based information.

For what it's worth, the US CDC has said this about (H1N1)pdm09. I'm not sure if H1N1 is a coronavirus though and I don't know if there's any published research supporting this. But the author's statement seems reasonable enough given it was qualified with "probably". > From April 12, 2009 to April 10, 2010, CDC estimated there were 60.8 million cases (range: 43.3-89.3 million), 274,304 hospitalizations (range: 195,0…

Nope - MERS and SARS were the only large Coronavirus outbreaks. H1N1 is an Influenza A strain (similar to the so-called Spanish Flu).

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#52

Post by jdminhbg »

dsamarin wrote: post #8
RobertRoberts wrote: post #2

Common sense needs to prevail over mania, numbers over hyperbole and science over conjecture. But even then, this is hard if our data is collected poorly and then poorly disseminated. So what is the answer then? Maybe a strengthening of resolve against all forms of panic? Is there a single event in history has been solved by panic?

Some historians attribute the French Revolution at least partly to a mass hysteria of the idea that aristocrats were planning on starving the populace during a grain shortage. And feudalism was abolished as a result.

Other countries managed to abolish feudalism without quite so many mass executions or consequent authoritarian strongmen plunging their continents into devastating series of wars.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#53

Post by Medicalidiot »

treyfitty wrote: post #39
Medicalidiot wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China quarantined 700 million of its citizens for fun and it still killed thousands. I'm sure that they regret the policies they implemented right now as they've finally gotten a hold of the outbreak. Edit: I was being sarcastic here. China messed up the initial response but their draconian tactics worked well.

Why would they regret it? I don’t follow your reasoning. They got a hold of the outbreak precisely because they ramped up quarantining

I was being sarcastic.... it never translates well over text.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#54

Post by nutjob2 »

partiallypro wrote: post #7
RobertRoberts wrote: post #2

Common sense needs to prevail over mania, numbers over hyperbole and science over conjecture. But even then, this is hard if our data is collected poorly and then poorly disseminated. So what is the answer then? Maybe a strengthening of resolve against all forms of panic? Is there a single event in history has been solved by panic?

The craziest stat I heard today was on my local news, and it was about COVID19 in the county, Davidson County (Nashville, TN,) they said of all the active cases in the county only 2 had been hospitalized. That's out of 163. The others were sent home to be quarantined and medicated. I was floored. Why are stats like that not shared? That seems like very valuable information. Hospitalization rates should be one of the…

> Why are stats like that not shared? That seems like very valuable information.

Because it's only 163, and data of an unknown quality.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#55

Post by guscost »

jtsnow wrote: post #22

Ioannidis continues to push this evidence-based approach, but I have not yet seen an adequate response to critics such as Nassim Taleb or Yaneer Bar-Yam. They argue that one doesn't need raw evidence to act if the statistical evidence shows that the risks are catastrophic. They published a paper on January 26th which lays out arguments for why conventional risk management approaches are inadequate in these situations…

> I have not yet seen an adequate response to critics such as Nassim Taleb or Yaneer Bar-Yam.

Is that even necessary? Taleb's school argues that empiricism has fundamental shortcomings because it must be "incomplete" in a world of imperfect (read: statistical) evidence. I agree it's a big problem, one that we are not likely to solve. But they go on to say "therefore, we must apply the precautionary principle to XYZ" which is frankly nonsense. Instinct might be important in Taleb's world of non-ergodic black swans, but that absolutely does not prove that his instinct is better than mine or yours!

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#56

Post by rumblecat »

jtsnow wrote: post #22

Ioannidis continues to push this evidence-based approach, but I have not yet seen an adequate response to critics such as Nassim Taleb or Yaneer Bar-Yam. They argue that one doesn't need raw evidence to act if the statistical evidence shows that the risks are catastrophic. They published a paper on January 26th which lays out arguments for why conventional risk management approaches are inadequate in these situations…

Risk management is the correct way to go when uncertainty is high. Containment was the correct approach at the time.

When evidence starts coming in, then you can start applying evidence based approaches.

> Mortality rate: Mortality and morbidity rates are also downward biased, due to the lag between identified cases, deaths and reporting of those deaths [1]

> Among 3,711 Diamond Princess passengers and crew, 712 (19.2%) had positive test results for SARS-CoV-2 (Figure 1). Of these, 331 (46.5%) were asymptomatic at the time of testing. Among 381 symptomatic patients, 37 (9.7%) required intensive care, and nine (1.3%) died (8) . . . As of March 13, among 428 U.S. passengers and crew, 107 (25.0%) had positive test results for COVID-19; 11 U.S. passengers remain hospitalized in Japan (median age = 75 years), including seven in serious condition (median age = 76 years) [2].

Based on the second source, who can still seriously believe that the naive death rate is too conservative, because all the people in intensive care just have not died yet?

Look at the deaths/recoveries in Singapore and Hong Kong for more evidence [3][4].

Whereas, if you compare fatality rates reported by Germany, SK, HK, Singapore and other high testers vs China, Italy and Spain, it's pretty clear the latter are under-diagnosing mild/asymptomatic cases, which increase their fatality rate by a factor of 10 or more.

[1] https://necsi.edu/systemic-risk-of-pandemic-via-novel-pathog...

[2] https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6912e3.htm?s_cid=mm...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_H...

[4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020_coronavirus_pandemic_in_S...

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#57

Post by toyg »

rglullis wrote: post #31
RobertRoberts wrote: post #2

Common sense needs to prevail over mania, numbers over hyperbole and science over conjecture. But even then, this is hard if our data is collected poorly and then poorly disseminated. So what is the answer then? Maybe a strengthening of resolve against all forms of panic? Is there a single event in history has been solved by panic?

This line of thinking is backwards. Usually the problems that we don't solve are the ones where we should have taken stronger measures (i.e, "panicked") earlier instead of waiting for evidence of a threat. We did listen to the ones crying (i.e, "panicking") over Y2K bug and a lot of money was spent on it before January 1st, 2000, so that got solved swiftly. On the other hand: - Had we listened to the ones crying (i.e…

Italy was one of the first countries to ban flights from China. Fat lot of good it did. But I agree that there should have been a stronger reaction, in terms of testing / tracing / isolating.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#58

Post by acqq »

guscost wrote: post #55
jtsnow wrote: post #22

Ioannidis continues to push this evidence-based approach, but I have not yet seen an adequate response to critics such as Nassim Taleb or Yaneer Bar-Yam. They argue that one doesn't need raw evidence to act if the statistical evidence shows that the risks are catastrophic. They published a paper on January 26th which lays out arguments for why conventional risk management approaches are inadequate in these situations…

> I have not yet seen an adequate response to critics such as Nassim Taleb or Yaneer Bar-Yam. Is that even necessary? Taleb's school argues that empiricism has fundamental shortcomings because it must be "incomplete" in a world of imperfect (read: statistical) evidence. I agree it's a big problem, one that we are not likely to solve. But they go on to say "therefore, we must apply the precautionary principle to XYZ"…

Taleb's point is that high uncertainties which can result in catastrophic loss are worth of spending money to protect against.

In our present case, the real nonsense is US allocating funds for a 1.5 trillion dollar plane, but totally avoiding investing in the response of pandemics... before it can be too late.

https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-long-will-it-ta...

"science can meet the challenges, but there is lots of attrition” before any vaccine gets to the point of licensure. The problem is twofold. First, there may never be a market for a vaccine at the end of the development process, because the epidemic is contained, or never comes to pass. Then, traditionally, if there is an epidemic, it may take hold in a developing country where the costs of research and development cannot be recouped. “The resources and expertise sit in biotech and pharma, and they’ve got their business model,” Grant said. “They’re not charities. They can’t do this stuff for free."

Were there early enough proper funding (surely insignificant compared to 1.5 trillion dollar) this pandemic could have been avoided and, additionally, in the case it couldn't have, the vaccine produced faster. (Bill and Melinda Gates tried to motivate others to do something about that, for years).

Once the virus spreads, it is totally irrelevant where it started.

Edit: and to answer to the message below: I don't have to prove anything. The exponential spread will do its work, independently of all of us. That exponential spread is not something that happens just with coronavirus, it was for decades a known fact. That's the nature of pandemics. The humans in charge ignored the fact at the humanity's peril. There's nothing that can disappear because your political beliefs are different. Even more directly, we're where we are exactly because the political beliefs resulted in the ignorance of the facts.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#59

Post by toyg »

jdminhbg wrote: post #52
dsamarin wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some historians attribute the French Revolution at least partly to a mass hysteria of the idea that aristocrats were planning on starving the populace during a grain shortage. And feudalism was abolished as a result.

Other countries managed to abolish feudalism without quite so many mass executions or consequent authoritarian strongmen plunging their continents into devastating series of wars.

... often just because rulers were so scared by the French experience, that they caved at the first demand for better forms of government.

In a similar way, a lot of worker rights gained in the XX century were introduced only because elites were utterly scared by the Soviet experience.

Sometimes it helps to have a reference, so to speak.

Re: Covid-19: the harms of exaggerated information and non‐evidence‐based measures

#60

Post by jsnell »

CriticalCathed wrote: post #43
jsnell wrote: post #35

The title is funny, since Ioannidis is actually the one proposing measures ("do nothing") based on no evidence and exaggeration. Basically every number in the paper is tainted by him cherry-picking the most optimistic number possible, and then trying to twist it further into something even better. Like his argument for the R0 being near 1.3 is just that it's "probably" the case. At some point we need to be able to ca…

Um. He doesn't advocate do nothing. He specifically says the opposite. Read the paper. WTF?

Sure he recommends researching vaccines faster, giving people flu vaccines since the flu is more serious than Covid, admitting fewer Covid patients into hospital care, and doing more research so that we're better prepared next time when something actually serious happens. Or if this is serious, doing more research so that the data is the most accurate possible.

I think calling that doing nothing is pretty generous. Since you disagree, what measure that he's proposing did you have in mind?

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