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Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

npr.org

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Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#71

Post by josefx »

tmotwu wrote: post #9
mmastrac wrote: post #3

The great thing about an algorithm is that when it gives you results that benefit you, you can accept them and then pass the buck on to it when people get outraged: "According to an email sent by a chief resident to other residents, Stanford's leaders explained that an algorithm was used to assign its first allotment of the vaccine. The algorithm was said to have prioritized those health care workers at highest risk…

The whole mess has demonstrated why ethical AI research is important. It's so easy for people to disregard why and how biases exist in their systems when it doesn't affect them personally.

What would be important are criminal charges for gross negligence while distributing vaccines to medical professionals in the middle of a fucking pandemic. In the best case prioritizing the administration was unintentional, which means nobody ran even basic sanity checks on the output until the staff noticed that they got almost nothing. Add in a murder charge for anyone in the area dying of COVID until the case is over.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#72

Post by taylortbb »

nextweek2 wrote: post #70

Medical professionals should not be in the early rounds of vaccines. If the vaccines have a delayed negative effect you cripple health care. Vaccines are great once they've had years of testing, but risk management would tell you to play it safe with critical staff. If the vaccine disabled 20% of medical professionals in January how many people would die as a consequence?

That's why we run trials. Over 20,000 people got this vaccine months ago, and have been carefully followed since. If it was going to wipe out 20% of people one month after injection we'd know already.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#73

Post by joshz404 »

nextweek2 wrote: post #70

Medical professionals should not be in the early rounds of vaccines. If the vaccines have a delayed negative effect you cripple health care. Vaccines are great once they've had years of testing, but risk management would tell you to play it safe with critical staff. If the vaccine disabled 20% of medical professionals in January how many people would die as a consequence?

This is not how any of this works...

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#74

Post by deathanatos »

cs702 wrote: post #64

In all likelihood, this was an innocent mistake (i.e., not done with malice)... but it's hard not be cynical about it, especially when we consider the context. Medical residents: 1) are at high risk, overworked, stressed out, and underpaid; 2) are regularly being called "heroes" in slick posters and PR campaigns; and 3) have just been left out of the initial vaccine allocation. The combination of 1), 2), and 3) seems…

> In all likelihood, this was an innocent mistake

From the article,

> While leadership is pointing to an error in an algorithm meant to ensure equity and justice, our understanding is this error was identified on Tuesday and a decision was made not to revise the vaccine allocation scheme before its release today," they wrote.

The residents' point here is that it ceases to be an innocent mistake when it is pointed out to you, and you deliberately decide to do nothing about it.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#75

Post by lock-free »

fairity wrote: post #28
jrochkind1 wrote: post #15

> "[A]lgorithms are made by people and the results ... were reviewed multiple times by people," You got that right. The way they talk about "an algorithm did it" makes it seem as as if they think that somehow explains it, like there was only one algorithm possible handed down from god or something. We'll be seeing more and more of this of course. "We can't be blamed, it was an algorithm! We can't be blamed for trusti…

I think most people are misunderstanding the likely root cause. > An algorithm was used to assign its first allotment of the vaccine. The algorithm prioritized health care workers at highest risk for COVID infections, along with factors like age and the location or unit where they work in the hospital. Residents did not have an assigned location, and along with their typically young age, they were dropped low on the…

The issue is not the algorithm but that the issues with it were identified in the days before the allotments finalized.

Meaning: administrators saw that the results were dumb, and didn't compensate.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#76

Post by hannob »

nextweek2 wrote: post #70

Medical professionals should not be in the early rounds of vaccines. If the vaccines have a delayed negative effect you cripple health care. Vaccines are great once they've had years of testing, but risk management would tell you to play it safe with critical staff. If the vaccine disabled 20% of medical professionals in January how many people would die as a consequence?

The possibility that a vaccine that has not shown any serious sideeffects until now will disable 20% of people getting it is extremely low. And you make the typical mistake of forgetting to weight vaccine risks against the risks of not vaccinating.

Is this possible that a yet completely unknown sideeffect that hasn't shown up until now will suddenly appear? Yes. Is it likely? No, absolutely not.

Is it possible that a mutated strain of Covid-19 will disable 20% of medical personel? Yes. Is it likely? No. But still: It's much more likely than a vaccine that has not shown any serious adverse events until now doing this.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#77

Post by iends »

nextweek2 wrote: post #70

Medical professionals should not be in the early rounds of vaccines. If the vaccines have a delayed negative effect you cripple health care. Vaccines are great once they've had years of testing, but risk management would tell you to play it safe with critical staff. If the vaccine disabled 20% of medical professionals in January how many people would die as a consequence?

Are you confusing medical trials with the vaccine rollout? The first vaccine was given March 16th.

Re: Stanford apologizes after vaccine allocation leaves out medical residents

#80

Post by cs702 »

deathanatos wrote: post #74
cs702 wrote: post #64

In all likelihood, this was an innocent mistake (i.e., not done with malice)... but it's hard not be cynical about it, especially when we consider the context. Medical residents: 1) are at high risk, overworked, stressed out, and underpaid; 2) are regularly being called "heroes" in slick posters and PR campaigns; and 3) have just been left out of the initial vaccine allocation. The combination of 1), 2), and 3) seems…

> In all likelihood, this was an innocent mistake From the article, > While leadership is pointing to an error in an algorithm meant to ensure equity and justice, our understanding is this error was identified on Tuesday and a decision was made not to revise the vaccine allocation scheme before its release today," they wrote. The residents' point here is that it ceases to be an innocent mistake when it is pointed out…

Do you actually think this was done with malice?

I doubt it. Per Hanlon's razor, we should never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by (bureaucratic) stupidity.[a]

[a] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hanlon's_razor

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