Florida Government Decides To Fire Its Data Chief Rather Than Be Honest About Its COVID Numbers
from the 'we've-found-a-cure-that's-worse-than-the-disease!' dept
We were promised no more deaths by May 15th, but that hasn't happened. With no one 100% sure what the best options are going forward, this is how states are handling the task of (lol) cautiously "reopening." A long press conference held by the Trump administration said states could reopen if they hit a number of checkpoints, including a certain amount of testing and a plateau/drop in positive cases.
A number of states appear to have stopped listening after the word "reopen." Whether or not they've hit the CDC's checkpoints does not appear to matter. A collective shrug about deaths and infections was issued by a number of governors, some of whom are (justifiably) tired of gun-toting residents showing up at the state house to protest their lack of access to haircuts and house parties.
When the data doesn't match the narrative, there's only one thing to do: fuck up the data. And the person who's compiling it. Florida has lots of sunny beaches that are currently too empty to satisfy sun junkies who wish to take advantage of the lengthy shorelines contained in America's Penis. COVID stats weren't exactly lending themselves to the "it's fine" narrative the governor wanted to push. So, the state government did some pushing of its own.
Late last Friday, the architect and manager of Florida's COVID-19 dashboard — praised by White House officials for its accessibility — announced that she had been removed from her post, causing outcry from independent researchers now worried about government censorship.
[...]
Citing "reasons beyond my division’s control," Jones said her office is no longer managing the dashboard, is no longer involved in publication, fixing errors or answering questions "in any shape or form."
She warned that she does not know what the new team's intentions are for data access, including "what data they are now restricting."
The means of impartial COVID stat reporting have been seized. Power to the (powerful) people! The dashboard that used to provide an easy-to-understand breakdown of the state's infection and death rates is being replaced with something that aligns more closely with the aura of sunny healthiness the state government wants to project. Dance through the droplets or whatever. Want to check the state's new math? Well, you can fuck right off, apparently.
When [researchers] tried requesting the previously available underlying data, DOH officials said that because the data are "provisional" no such requests would be considered until May 2021.
Yet the state regularly publishes provisional data, including for infectious diseases such as influenza.
Here's the governor's literally unbelievable defense of his indefensible actions: when someone asks for time off, they're clearly asking to be fired and for their work to be destroyed.
When first asked about Jones' dismissal, [Governor Ron] DeSantis on Monday called it a "nonissue." He said he understood from an email she sent her supervisor that "she was tired and needed a break."
He then went on to claim -- after being given a few days to compose his thoughts -- that this firing was due to "repeated insubordination" rather than the researcher just being tired. "Insuboridination" apparently means publishing actual COVID stats rather than manipulated data that provides post hoc justification for the state government's reopening plans.
The state is now open. Whether or not that's good for residents and visitors remains to be seen. The state has taken control of a narrative. Since the real numbers aren't aligned with the state's official OPEN FOR BUSINESS pitch, the state apparently felt its only option was to fire the person compiling the data.
Now, residents and visitors will have only the state-approved numbers to rely on. Let's hope they don't. If this turns into another pandemic nightmare that the state could have avoided by being honest, citizens are going to start wondering why government entities are immunized against manslaughter charges. And those who demanded at gunpoint that the government take the brakes off the state economy are welcome to discover firsthand why an overabundance of caution is preferable to caution that's been carried off by the wind.
This is a state that has decided to lie to everyone, starting with itself. Govern yourself accordingly.
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Filed Under: cdc, covid-19, data, florida, guidelines, rebekah jones, reopening, ron desantis, transparency
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What you don't know can't hurt you.
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When reality doesn't fit your agenda, fire and lie, it's the Republican way.
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There is a lot more to this story than your very biased article mentions. Such info has been published in newspapers such as the Gainesville Sun and Ocala Star Banner. The bottom line is that what she did was help design the system, not input the data. So, this really is a non-issue. If you go to the Floridahealth.gov covid-19 page and look at the data, we are getting the same data and it is far more data than many states are releasing.
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Re:
Unfortunately, it seems to be rampant on both sides of the aisle.
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Can you access that data? If not, this is an actual issue.
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Republicans do it far more often, though. Who was it that claimed voter fraud was so rampant that it needed to be investigated, then refused to release the findings of such an investigation to Congress (or the general public) and disbanded the team created to carry out that investigation? Because it sure as shit wasn’t Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, Chuck Schumer, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, or any other Democrat.
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Fortunately, many humans are now aware of the lopsidedness of this both sides argument.
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"There is a lot more to this story than your very biased article mentions."
There is always much more to every story, where have you been?
In addition, everything every human does is biased. What sort of bias are you referring to? Is there anything that is incorrect? Perhaps you could point it out?
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I will shut them down if they do not report the numbers that I think are real!
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Meta
Tim, do you really need to use profanity for these articles? I’m not a (fucking!) prude, but it seems so unnecessary.
Momma always said, if your not smart enough to express yourself without profanity, go right ahead, but others will know you are not smart enough to express yourself without profanity.
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"Millions will cry your name, Governor."
"My twitter followers?"
"Your victims."
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Re: Meta
Don't be so fuckin' hard on Tim! He's a damned fine writer, and this is a damned important story about the government treating us like shit.
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But if it DOESN'T turn into a nightmare, then the nanny state health "experts" will be exposed as Chicken-Littles, and citizens will continue to lose faith in the elitists. I can't predict what will happen, but you have to admit that it's surprisingly high stakes either way.
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Well... in the case of a pandemic the opposite is true, so...
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Can you name a recent example of a Democrat doing this? There may well be one I just can't think of an example.
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Re: Meta
Writers have individual styles, if you dislike this writer, the byline is there to tell you not to bother if you wish. That's easier than trying to get a writer to change his style for your sensibilities.
"if your not smart enough"
Lol.
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Re: Re: Re:
And yet, I can think of many from the other side in recent memory. Including from our presidential clown.
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You mean rampant on one side. Rare on the other.
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In your dreams.
A hypothetical pandemic response resulting in less death would be considered overkill because it worked? This sot of reasoning is part of what got us into this mess in the first place. High stakes indeed, honesty versus fealty.
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Re: Re: Meta
Tim is not going to offend me. But I can't pass along links to others that might be. Limiting your audience may not be the best way to promote your point.
But I get your comment. It is what it is.
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SARS2 doesn't care about nanny states, experts or Chicken-Littles.
It spreads easily from person to person, destroys lung alveoli at much higher rates than normal flu.
Only covidiots don't understand this.
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America's Penis
America needs gender reassignment surgery.
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Re: Re: Re: Meta
Yes, but some might be attracted by his attitude rather then put off by it... In fact, by reading then complaining you already gave the piece more engagement and attention, and thus advertising, than you would have otherwise.
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Re: Re:
These are people who still haven't learned that the reason to wear masks is to protect people from you, not to protect you from others. Hence their confused reactions when the one person who refuses to be kind to others gets met with hostility when they walk into a store loudly announcing their intention to infect others. These are not smart people.
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Re: Re:
Why not? Consider Y2K. Big craziness about what would happen, programmers getting pulled out of retirement to fix things, and when the day came? Nothing happened. Now the hysteria is considered a joke, but what doesn't seem to be considered is the idea that maybe nothing happened because it got fixed.
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Re: Re: Re:
My wife has been making masks for about 2 months now. They allow a N95 filter to be placed inside. Without the filter, then the wearer is protecting the spread. With the filter, then it's both ways.
What the idiots don't get is that wearing a mask isn't taking away any freedoms.
Stores already don't allow service to those without shoes (doesn't spread SARS2), shirts (doesn't spread SARS2) and now masks (DOES SPREAD SARS2).
They might as well protest wearing pants.
alldicksout
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Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Maybe reporting all the numbers would clue in the clueless. This article speaks from a position of authority without understanding. Similar to how most feel about Trump. (Still a better choice than Hillary)
First thing: This will kill you. if you are old or in poor health. if you have comorbidities that make you susceptible, of if you have bad luck. (Wait I have seen this before... Oh yes the Flu)
The response to this has been an overwhelming S**t show. The administration had a barely conceived plan that was decimated by an overzealous media and very poor models with even worse data. And if someone disagrees we take the democrat approach to looking at others opinions and label them as liars and spreading a false narrative.
The states that are reopening are doing it for the greater good. A concept lost on the media and the groups that want to socialize the US. Th
You cannot attach a value to a life. You can say that the future of the epople of this country outweighs a single life.
If you want to be serious about this look at the leading cause of deaths and work on them
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PSA: there are some disinformation agents spreading the baseless slander against this whistleblower from FOX subsidiary "tallahasseereports".
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Classic projection there, considering the pile of disinformation that followed.
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And look at this graph put out Georgia's State government, and pay close attention to the order of the county bars and the dates on the x-axis.
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Only with Covid-19, the risks are magnified by almost an order of magnitude.
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Don't be a idiot. Before this wave of coronavirus is done it will have at least 1000% the fatalities of annual flu. And, like the flu, it will keep coming back every year, still killing 10 times the number of people flu does.
If you really believe flu and COVID-19 you're either ill-informed or misinformed. Of course there is still the possibility that you're just incredibly stupid.
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
The administration had a barely conceived plan that was decimated by an overzealous media and very poor models with even worse data.
When your plan amounts to "the cases are going to fall to zero" or "it's going to magically disappear" the fault in that useless pile of shit being decimated is not the media.
It's because the president is a fucking idiot. That's not the media's fault - he speaks, looks like a fool, and the media reports on it.
Or is this another "who knew that being a leader during a pandemic was complicated?"
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Re: Meta
If after reading an article about 'state governor fires someone for literally unbelievable reason so that they can open the state during a global pandemic, likely leading to a massive spike in hospitalizations/deaths' the part that sticks out as most offensive is the swearing you need to get your priorities looked at.
There are times when a 'darn' is appropriate and times when a 'damn' is, this is most certainly the latter.
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
"flu and COVID-19 are equally dangerous"
Damn it :-|
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'Who cares about lives, there's money out there being unspent!'
Well, nice of them to out themselves as caring more about creating a temporary spike in cashflow than lives, just a pity it will be shortly followed by a spike in fatalities as the second wave hits and impacts the idiots too impatient or to stupid to understand that something with a body count reaching one hundred thousand in the US alone can kill them and their families too.
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Re: America's Penis
Based on the number of boobs running the place, maybe we're already started?
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Re: Re: Re:
From California:
https://www.themarshallproject.org/2020/05/27/how-to-hide-a-covid-19-hotspot-pretend-pri soners-don-t-exist
Wouldn't employees come in contact with infected but asymptomatic prisoners? Shouldn't that be taken into account?
Difference is, some might be "open and in your face" and others "couch in mushy language"
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
The flu killed an average of 35k-37k people per year in the US from 2010 to now (CDC, range depends if you use preliminary numbers).
COVID-19 has killed 101k people in the US in three months.
If you think COVID-19 is like the flu you're a fucking moron (sorry pegr) there's no way around it. Those who want to remove restrictions due to economic meanings, this says more about their lack of morals than their intelligence. Don't worry, you fail both tests.
You say "You cannot attach a value to a life." This seems to indicate that you think life has no value.
Other causes of death are being worked on. Your lot would complain their rights are being infringed because they can't have a picnic in a Superfund site.
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Re: Re: Re:
"Why not?"
Well - ok, it will be considered overkill by those who know not what they are talking about.
Apparently it was a huge deal for those financial institutions who use cobol.
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
"the pile of disinformation that followed."
Yup - and a total lack of information about Sweden.
Sweden actually tried the do nothing approach hoping for herd immunity real fast. Well, it is not working and they now have a much higher death rate then elsewhere,
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Inappropriate Attacks in the Article
Look, write article. It's an important topic. However, please just leave out lines like this:
I should think TechDirt would more respect than that for the subject, for the people of the state, and for basic principles of journalism. It also isn't an approach that will actually reach people. Tim, I expect better from you.
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Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
"for the greater good"
Whose greater good? I think you know the answer.
And why is this greater good you talk about so good for the select few that it is good for?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Meta
Don't worry, plenty of people will be attracted by the attitude. We all know that attitude is what sells products and ideas.
I would also rather he stop. I don't get my feelings hurt by it, but I would prefer to read information and evaluate it without having to sift through dick jokes and miscellaneous invective.
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Yes, the lost access to the "provisional" data is a new development. If the data is so provisional, then the dashboard itself is "provisional" and of little value for information or decision-making. They're releasing case counts within 24 hours.
Another oddity in the Florida data from the very beginning even before this, was that they don't do a very good job of reporting recovered cases. Some counties still have zero recoveries reported, or the ratio of reported deaths to reported recoveries is > 1 to 1.
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And what do you think those programmers were doing, sitting about waiting for the apocalypse, ow working hard to prevent it?
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Re: Re: Meta
The fact that's what he decided to comment on doesn't imply that that is what he found most offensive about the whole situation.
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Re: Inappropriate Attacks in the Article
You should adjust your expectations to include juvenile dick jokes (is there another kind?) in any story from Cushing.
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Re: Inappropriate Attacks in the Article
I thought it was more of an insult to penises. To each their own, I guess.
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Re: Re: Re:
So...
1) Problems if we don't do something about it...
2) Did something about it...
3) Almost no problems...
Because we did something about it.
Not sure I'm following the illogic here....
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Re: Re: Re:
Yes, exaclty, let's consider Y2K. It's a perfect analogy.
You see, the reason that nothing happened on the day of Y2K is because all of those programmers came out of the woodwork and put in the hours and hours of work to make sure that everything was fixed.
They succeeded, so nothing happened. Y2K catastrophes did not happen because people made sure that all these core systems were actually Y2K compliant.
The pandemic follows a similar path. If countries do everything right, then the predicted catastrophes don't happen, because they took steps to prevent them. Mitigation efforts, such as lockdowns and quarantines, if properly followed, have the effect of drastically reducing the infection rates. That "nothing is happening" is evidence that the approaches are working.
The predicted catastrophes are what happens if people don't do what they need to. As states and government ignore the necessary steps to prevent pandemic catastrophe, we will see more infections, we will see more deaths.
What the US of A is seeing now, is akin to what could have happened if people didn't take Y2K seriously and didn't put the work to prevent the problem.
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Wrong. Incidence and mortality are similar to flu
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Democrat! as described above
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
Trump is clueless no doubt but the media pushed the frenzy.
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Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad col
couldnt get herd immunity because it is actually kinda hard to catch
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Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad col
Then why did New York have to get out refrigerated vans as temporary morgues, and bury people in mass graves?
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Yeah, but it WAS Democrats who refused to release the exact findings of either of the CDC studies on gun violence that have been done in the past 25 years.
The first (officially unpublished but available through FOIA) is the source of the pro-gun claim that there are over 2 million good uses of guns every year.
The second was published, but they didn't cite actual numbers, just made a vague statement that their earlier study appeared to still be true.
Both parties have a bad habit of burying facts that undermine their ideology.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
The illogic comes when people see "almost no problems" and conclude "overreaction to a non-problem" instead of "hey we fixed it, good job!"
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad
gonna need a reference on that
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Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad col
"Wrong. Incidence and mortality are similar to flu"
All I have read state that covid has a much higher mortality, perhaps you have something to read up on this?
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Wow, that's Trump levels of stupid right there.
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Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad col
As been said again and again, anyone comparing the rates doesn't understand the underlying metrics and how to use them.
Just let me pose a simple question to see if you understand the basics: The health-care system in Sweden is by all reports coping with all the cases and have about 20% capacity left - so why does it seem like Sweden have a high death-rate?
If you can answer that question you also will understand why comparing absolute numbers is just plain stupid.
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No, that was Republicans who forced them to stop the studies.
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Re: Meta
Momma was a dumbass and you are merely a tone troll.
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Re:
Good snowclone paraphrasing there.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad
Why are you complaining about absolute numbers when he mentioned death rate - not death count?
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Do you have health insurance? Invest in the stock market? Use any kind of safety gear ir devices?
Or do you live hand-to-mouth, naked in the woods?
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Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad col
What frenzy?
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Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad cold
You forgot "fire people who actually know how to handle things and have the completely unqualified political appointees make decisions".
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Re: Inappropriate Attacks in the Article
More tone trolls! Yay! \㋡/
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Re: Re:
Well, what else would you expect from Georgia?
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"They might as well protest wearing pants."
Actually, there's a good analogy for that here, and it is pretty much what they are doing:
https://couriernewsroom.com/2020/05/01/we-asked-health-experts-about-the-wear-your-mask-the-urine-t est-meme/
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a
For the record, the death rate in Sweden is currently 418/million, which places it 8th highest in the world.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Meta
Then stop reading and commenting when you see his name on the byline. If enough people do this, then I'm sure something will change. Otherwise, nobody cares whether his style is to your personal taste, and whining about it here only drives his numbers up.
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Thanks for the cite, that does look bad.
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Re: Inappropriate Attacks in the Article
Why?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a
Because the death-rate is directly derived from absolute numbers that doesn't reflect the number of infected, where in time the spread is, the rate of spread and how the deaths are measured.
The death-rate is only accurate when the metrics used is number of infected / number of related deaths. Until the infection has spread through the whole population (or herd immunity kicks in), comparing the death-rate that's calculated on the whole population is a bit meaningless since you are comparing metrics that are measured differently due to the fact the numbers are strongly influenced by the measures taken to control the spread, the real number of infected and what is considered to be a COVID-19 related death.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy ov
See my answer above why you can't compare the numbers.
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Florida. Amerika's penis.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy ov
It's not the whole picture, but I disagree that it's meaningless. A higher death rate is always worse. The specifics and cause of it can vary, but that's the big picture. If a country takes an action and the death rate goes down, that's good. Maybe mortality was reduced. Maybe transmission was reduced. Maybe hospital services were improved. We can't tell everything about Sweden from the death rate, but we can tell that something is not working as well there compared to otherwise similar European countries because their death rate is much higher.
Yes, what I said assumes a consistent standard for measuring deaths. If you don't have that, then there is no point in comparing numbers.
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Indeed. They're this kind of people.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad
If that were true we wouldn't be in the middle of a pandemic.
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Re: Re:
"Some of the data might not be accurate."
"Okay so we should continue to monitor it while still releasing all the data so we have the most comprehensive point of view possible?
"No we're going to stop sharing any of the data."
...really Florida?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenzy over a bad
The morgue bit is a good rebuttal, but the mass grave bit isn't. There have been over a million people buried in that "mass grave" over the last 150 years. It's just what New York does with unclaimed bodies. There are more of them, yes, but it's not new.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven frenz
No, a higher death-rate isn't necessarily worse. You are totally missing the point, the death-rate is entirely due to a couple of factors, and total population isn't really one of them.
If you have an extremely effective lockdown and only a low percentage of the population gets infected you get a very low number for the death-rate.
If you have very poor lockdown a higher percentage will be infected which means a higher death-rate.
If you have very poor lockdown in conjunction with a health-care system that can't cope, you will get even higher rates.
Now answer me this: Are the rates above dependent on population size or the number of infected?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driven f
Under what circumstances would it be better?
Which is good.
And that would be worse.
Which is even worse.
Both, since the number of infected depends on the population size and the rate of infection.
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Re: Re: Re:
The CDC has better things it should be focusing on?
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From what I heard, countries like Russia who did not put a ton of effort into Y2K didn't have anything catastrophic happen either.
Given that we have states that have locked down and states that have not, by now we should have some data on how the lockdowns worked.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media driv
If that's your position, then it follows that the death-rate must be different for every country according to their population size if everything else is the same.
Does that sound plausible to you? I'm afraid you haven't thought this through to it's logical conclusion.
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Re: Re: Re: Re:
Almost no problems... with deaths from COVID.
What about the problem of the vastly higher number of deaths over the long term (and not just from the elderly and immunocompromised that COVID actually kills) from suicide, depression-related risk-increasing behavior (drug, alcohol, cigarettes), unemployment, failed businesses
...from the economy-killing overreaction the Chicken Littles agitated for (and continue to agitate for) to...
...save some elderly and immunocompromise from dying of COVID?
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Re: Re:
"We chopped off everyone's left hand to prevent a UFO invasion from killing us all!"
"Well, I don't think a UFO invasion was going to actu-"
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Pandemic defined: media
No, because it's a rate. If everything else is the same, death rate will be the same too, and death count will vary with population.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
And drivel like that is how anti-lockdown types reveal their complete ignorance of math, germ theory, law, and economics.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re:
"From what I heard, countries like Russia who did not put a ton of effort into Y2K didn't have anything catastrophic happen either."
Define "catastrophic". The tales of lanes dropping from the skies were never going to happen, but there's no doubt that major issues with normal operation, financial records and so on would be experience everywhere if nothing had been done.
"Given that we have states that have locked down and states that have not, by now we should have some data on how the lockdowns worked."
You do, and they did. In fact we have enough data to show how many additional lives could have been saved if Trump had taken action earlier instead of pretending it was a hoax
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52757150
The question now is whether you can re-open without a massive second wave of infections.
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"What about the problem of the vastly higher number of deaths over the long term"
I'll be happy to read the study that proves this assertion.
"from the economy-killing overreaction the Chicken Littles agitated for"
Just a hint: "Chicken Little" refers to a reaction to something that's not going to happen, not a pandemic that's killed over 360,000 people worldwide and about which we know that nearly all US deaths could have been prevented by Trump taking action one March 1st.
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You are contradicting yourself. The question I asked was Are the rates above dependent on population size or the number of infected? and you answered:
The death-rate is dependent on 3 major metrics (and a bunch of minor ones like age and pre-existing conditions): the number of infected, the lethality of the virus and the availability to healthcare - population size doesn't really matter which was my original point.
The only time the population size will matter in this context is after the pandemic has passed.
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It looks to me like your original point was that death rate doesn't matter. You also haven't explained how a higher death rate can be a better outcome. I would be very interested to hear about that.
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Look it up. their incidence is similar to countries that quarantined heavily. 6 to 7%. Their deaths are higher and I haven't seen anything that points to a specific reason. If the incidence is similar there is something else driving their deaths up.
It may be how widespread testing is. However it looks like their testing is broad enough that the incidence shouldn't change significantly
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Yeah i got flagged for looking at numbers and stating something different to the accepted norm based no models that were crap
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[Asseets facts not in evidence]
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The reference requested was for the claim "it is actually kinda hard to catch". Nothing to do with any particular country.
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Wait, you want to do what to Florida?
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"Their deaths are higher and I haven't seen anything that points to a specific reason"
Which countries specifically are you thinking of? The reason why Spain and Italy have higher death rates is because they were hit hard and early before lockdown, while countries like South Korea that also quarantined heavily, but before the main pandemic hit them hard, have very low death rates
Do you have any specific countries in mind, or were you hoping that someone would point out the obvious?
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"Yeah i got flagged for looking at numbers and stating something different to the accepted norm based no models that were crap"
Did you provide any evidence for that claim? That usually makes the difference. people coming in here and going "I have no citations or qualifications but I like this already disproven theory" do tend to be flagged as liars.
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The original premise was that the death-rate is based on population-size, which doesn't really give you a metric that's usable in any practical sense (until the pandemic is over).
And you are wondering why a higher death-rate in the above context can be better, it's very simple: If you have a high percentage of infected together with a healthcare system that can handle it you will get a higher rate than a country with very few cases. In the first instance you allow the pandemic to spread in a controlled fashion which means it will be over faster, the second instance means the infection will linger for a very long time in the population.
Regardless, everything else being equal in the two scenarios above - the percentage of people dying who has been infected should be the same, it's just that a country who "optimizes" the handling of the pandemic will have a seemingly higher rate per pop than a country who have a tight lockdown until it's over.
This is basic stuff, I don't understand why people don't get it.
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Perhaps some confusion is over what is in the denominator of death rate - population or infected. Which do you mean?
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The numbers people are throwing around is usually deaths per 1M pop, which means a higher number only indicates that more people are infected.
The rate that matters is deaths per infected, which reflects all the important metrics. There are 2 problems though, one is that we don't have good graps on how many are infected in an population, mostly due to insufficient tests and the other is countries vary in what they consider to be a death due to COVID-19.
Regardless, the deaths per infected much better reflect how a country copes with the pandemic than deaths per 1M pop.
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Seems they're just measuring different things, so it depends what you want to know. Deaths per infected tells you how well the cases are being managed, and how lethal it is, but says nothing about how much it's spreading. Deaths per million people gives you a better sense of how likely you are to die from it, because without the rate of infection you can't get that just from deaths per infected.
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"which means a higher number only indicates that more people are infected"
No, it doesn't. For example, (as of now, 8:25am CET on 31/05) Spain has 27,125 dead from 286,308 infected, yet the UK has 38,376 dead from 272,826 infected. Yet, the death/1M figures are 580 for Spain and only 566 for the UK. That's the reverse of what you just claimed.
"insufficient tests and the other is countries vary in what they consider to be a death due to COVID-19"
On top of that, some countries are clearly providing inaccurate numbers - you'd have to be really dumb to be taking the figures from China and Russia at face value. The real figures will take a long time to come out, as the urgency of this situation is guaranteed to be causing some mistakes and misreporting in the short term.
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Paul, your second statement about inaccurate reporting also makes your first statement inaccurate.
There's a direct relationship between the real number of infected and COVID-19 deaths, there is no such direct relationship for population size until the pandemic is over. That's why I'm saying that the numbers you are comparing can't really be compared.
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"Paul, your second statement about inaccurate reporting also makes your first statement inaccurate."
No, it means that the countries I mentioned have far more trustworthy reporting than the ones I mentioned which do not.
All said, this is an ongoing situation for which we will not have all the facts confirmed for a long time. Even under normal circumstances, correct determinations of deaths can take some time, and concerns over testing numbers and accuracy also introduce some inaccuracies. With current pressures, there will be some noise in the data until after the dust is settled.
Having said that, general trends are visible from those countries over whom there is no reason to suspect is lying about their figures, and the fact is that these numbers are saying the opposite of what you believe they should. The trends are what's important here, not the raw figures.
"That's why I'm saying that the numbers you are comparing can't really be compared."
...and by your standards, neither can the ones you insist of comparing. If you admit that we cannot trust some death reporting, then we sure as hell can't trust the reporting of infection, so your own referred deaths per infection number is also questionable. Between the two, the per 1M figures are therefore preferable, since at least we know accurate population data, whereas in per infected both figures are suspect.
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I have never said that infected/deaths was 100% accurate, I've said it was a much relevant number when comparing how countries cope.
The 1M figures isn't preferable since they aren't relevant at this time due to the fact that the whole population isn't infected. That number will always trend upwards until the pandemic is over, and it can't be compared since it's dependent on a multitude of underlying factors.
If you are interested in how big a percentage of infected actually dies, why use a number that doesn't tell you that? If you want to use that number and the expected mortality from COVID-19 is for example 1%, then 1% of the population must die for the numbers to be relevant - regardless how many actually get infected in the end.
Regardless of the inaccuracies in the reported metrics, if we disregard the outliers where it's obvious that the data doesn't reflect reality - that doesn't invalidate that the rate of infected/death is far more accurate than population/death.
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"If you are interested in how big a percentage of infected actually dies, why use a number that doesn't tell you that?"
Because it's the best we've got. Due to poor testing, both in quality and number, and the likely number of asymptomatic cases who won't have been tested at all, it will be a long time before we have an accurate representation of the number of infected. So, we use the number we know are as accurate as possible, which is population.
"If you want to use that number and the expected mortality from COVID-19 is for example 1%, then 1% of the population must die for the numbers to be relevant"
No. If everyone's working with the same handicap, then we can account for that. If we're introducing the idea that both figures used in the comparison are likely to be wrong, they're useless. The real figure we're interested in is trends, and it's more useful to use the 1M figure for that at the moment until we can be confident about other data.
"that doesn't invalidate that the rate of infected/death is far more accurate than population/death."
Long term, when accurate figures are available for both infected and dead, sure. Right now, when we're balancing different testing and reporting standards and trying to make real time decisions based on the best information available? No. All it takes is a bad batch of tests or an unknown cluster of asymptomatic carriers to skew decisions, whereas population trends give better indications. Not ideal, but better than the alternative.
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Better indication of what? That a larger population means higher numbers or that more infected means higher numbers?
Can we agree on that if you aren't infected you can't die from COVID-19? By including the whole population you skew the numbers in such a way that they don't represent how a country handles those who have been infected.
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"Better indication of what? That a larger population means higher numbers or that more infected means higher numbers?"
That a trend toward more deaths per capita means there's more of a problem. Whether that means infected are undercounted or dead are overcounted is an issue for later.
"Can we agree on that if you aren't infected you can't die from COVID-19?"
Yes, just as if you're not infected by smallpox you won't die from it. That doesn't mean that tracking smallpox deaths was a bad thing to do.
Also, it's not about you. Asymptomatic infections are still a thing. Your selfish ass might have escaped both detection and symptoms but you still infected others. When you can't correctly identify the infected, how do you know the dead aren't coming?
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That's not given, it can also mean that every metric is totally accurate but the infection is spreading which increases the 1M pop/death ratio but the infected/death ratio stays the same.
Paul, go read up on why CMR (Crude Mortality Rate, ie 1M pop/death) isn't a usable number during a pandemic. See https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/coronavirus-death-rate/ under the header Herd Immunity and final Crude Mortality Rate
Just slightly above that you have a blurb about IFR (Infection Fatality Risk, what I'm talking about), and somewhere else the defintion of CFR (Case Fatility Risk) is also mentioned.
BBC also has a good article about the different rates: https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200401-coronavirus-why-death-and-mortality-rates-differ
The only way 1M pop/death is somewhat usable is to look at curve of the trend to roughly estimate how the mitigation of the spread is working.
Which isn't relevant to what I'm saying since the lethality of the virus doesn't change dependent on how you measure asymptomatic or symptomatic cases. Unless you think the virus somehow gains lethality proportionally to population size?
Just let me ask a very simple question: Does the current 1M pop/death-rate accurately describe a persons chance of dying if they get infected with COVID-19?
If your answer is no, then the number isn't really relevant.
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"That's not given, it can also mean that every metric is totally accurate"
It can, but we know for sure that neither the infection nor the death figures are totally accurate at this moment in time.
"Paul, go read up on why CMR (Crude Mortality Rate, ie 1M pop/death) isn't a usable number during a pandemic. "
So, given that we know that neither infection nor death figures are totally accurate, which figure is best to use instead?
"Which isn't relevant to what I'm saying since the lethality of the virus doesn't change dependent on how you measure asymptomatic or symptomatic cases."
No, it's not. However, it does mean that infection number are not going to be accurate, and will possibly be completely misleading.
"Does the current 1M pop/death-rate accurately describe a persons chance of dying if they get infected with COVID-19?"
No, but the trends of that data give a reasonable idea of how well the measures in each country are affecting it. The whole thing we're trying to work out is how the measures in each country are affecting the outcome, and deaths/1M is more useful than raw death or infection figures.
I know what you're trying to say here, my point is simply that since infection figures are a) known to be inaccurate and b) may be so inaccurate that they're exponentially wrong until we can measure asymptomatic cases, that they're not going to give more accurate figures than per capita/1M, and that's even before you start considering the countries known to be outright lying about infections.
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