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Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

maximumtruth.substack.com

61–70 of 151 posts

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#61
I can get onboard with most of this.. until the end. COVID deaths don’t just mean everyone losing 15 days of life. To me it meant multiple family members dying. It means my respiratory system has been absolutely wrecked, hopefully not forever but for at least several months now. It means my infant son is gasping for breath on my lap as I write this and there’s nothing we can do for him. Statistics in white towers are so decoupled from humanity they are worse than useless; these selfish attitudes cause real harm.

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is it really a "caveat" when it entirely invalidates any attempt at causal analysis with this data? So much for "maximum truth". This is a nice data visualization exercise and descriptive analysis, but that's it.

There is plenty of other data that supports the assumption that the vast majority of deaths here is due to COVID. Not all causes of death here are equally plausible.

Some of the approaches used for counting such deaths should be considered quite suspect.

Take Toronto, the most populous city in Canada, and one of the most populous in North America, for example.

This is how Toronto's public health unit described its methodology:

"Individuals who have died with COVID-19, but not as a result of COVID-19 are included in the case counts for COVID-19 deaths in Toronto."

https://twitter.com/TOPublicHealth/status/127588839006028596...

That results in a death count that's effectively useless, and could even be seen as misleading.

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typical hindsight bias. At the time of the debate (April 2020) we DID NOT have the data to say that a lockdown was unnecessary.

Nor did we have the data to say it WAS necessary, but we sure as hell could predict most of the negative social and economic side effects easily. Causing profound developmental delays in an entire generation of children and lowering lifetime educational attainment for almost every single teenager was worth it though, I guess.

The principle of caution cuts both ways. During the pandemic, it seems to have only cut one way.

It is possible to support lockdowns while still recognizing this.

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#65

Sweden Age Adjusted Mortality 3rd January 2020 through 18th June 2021: -2.3% Source: ONS Not only did lockdowns fail, they were unnecessary and cruel and tyrannical. I sincerely hope that the responsible people will face justice that is just as harsh as the lockdown enforcement was.

Typical hindsight bias. At the time of the debate (April 2020) we DID NOT have the data to say that a lockdown was unnecessary.

So they were just accidentally correct?

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typical hindsight bias. At the time of the debate (April 2020) we DID NOT have the data to say that a lockdown was unnecessary.

Nor did we have the data to say it WAS necessary, but we sure as hell could predict most of the negative social and economic side effects easily. Causing profound developmental delays in an entire generation of children and lowering lifetime educational attainment for almost every single teenager was worth it though, I guess.

We had data from December 2019 until April 2020 showing that it spread quickly and can kill you.

We also had data that strong action can stop an outbreak (i.e. Aviation flu, Swine Flu, Ebola, etc). Sure when we took those actions early enough to curtail the outbreak it leads to people thinking the actions were useless (see Y2K debate) but it doesn't actually mean the actions were useless. People only notice when the dam collapses, not when it doesn't.

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#67

Sweden Age Adjusted Mortality 3rd January 2020 through 18th June 2021: -2.3% Source: ONS Not only did lockdowns fail, they were unnecessary and cruel and tyrannical. I sincerely hope that the responsible people will face justice that is just as harsh as the lockdown enforcement was.

you are making the classic mistake of judging past actions with future knowledge. Lockdowns work and they worked well given what what was known at the time. They are also good at reducing social contacts for transmissible disease and the best evidence of this was the almost total lack of a flu season in the northern hemisphere. While the social and economic cost is now known to be immense, public health officials hav…

In the absence of data do something drastic. Got it.

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#68

Sweden Age Adjusted Mortality 3rd January 2020 through 18th June 2021: -2.3% Source: ONS Not only did lockdowns fail, they were unnecessary and cruel and tyrannical. I sincerely hope that the responsible people will face justice that is just as harsh as the lockdown enforcement was.

A respiratory disease requires collocation of people. How do people get infected in a lockdown? Over the internet?

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#69

Sweden Age Adjusted Mortality 3rd January 2020 through 18th June 2021: -2.3% Source: ONS Not only did lockdowns fail, they were unnecessary and cruel and tyrannical. I sincerely hope that the responsible people will face justice that is just as harsh as the lockdown enforcement was.

> Not only did lockdowns fail That's the exact opposite conclusion the article finds while taking into account more countries and just one. If you have to search out a single country out of over a hundred to find supporting data you probably are just p-hacking .... Like go to the store and buy identical pens but of 100 different colors. Now throw them down the stairs and record which goes the farthest. Now repeat it…

Sweden was the well publicized "control group."

It was not selected post-hoc, it was selected in 2020.

The result was more death early and less death later, while suffering no learning loss or adverse effects on the children and little loss in quality of life.

Here's an article from 2020 disparaging the high costs [0].

If you find any major news giving an update now that Finland and Norway have caught up in excess death, please share.

[0] https://www.science.org/content/article/it-s-been-so-so-surr...

Re: Covid “Fudge Factor” – A map of Covid data corruption and approach that worked

#70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Typical hindsight bias. At the time of the debate (April 2020) we DID NOT have the data to say that a lockdown was unnecessary.

Going by this argument we should lock down for every possible adverse future event where it might help. Thinking about it lockdowns could definitely help with climate change, should we just lock down for the next 20 years?

What a nice strawman you constructed there.
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