Posted on 04/08/2020 5:52:50 AM PDT by Factuality
I have this stupid question. I was looking at the data on this site, https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/us/ and I was wondering who supplies this data? How are the people supplying this data vetted? On the website is a tab, "Report coronavirus cases". It appears that anyone could report cases. The only criteria is to supply a link to where you got the data. The where appears to be any website to include twitter, etc. It also appears that this data is being used by some mainstream media folks. Am I reading this right?
If you click on USA, you can see the sources used for each state in the right hand column.
"This project was launched out of The Atlantic to fill a major gap in publicly available COVID-19 testing data. Johns Hopkins University maintains a comprehensive case count, but no governmental or institutional source is publishing complete testing data—including not just identified cases, but how many people have been tested, and where. Without this data, we can't make informed decisions or accurately communicate risks."
The Covid Tracking Project data is used by:
The Atlantic
CNN
Washington Post
New York Times
Vox
ProPublica
Wall Street Journal
I think this event points to the general lack of clarity of all data that gets wide media attention and results in regulation now. The sources are murky and the interpretations are suspect. The CD data historically is a list of ranges that often are double low to high. I don’t think anyone knows how historical illnesses have tracked in the US, and that includes HIV, Ebola, Mers and the regular flu.
We now live by computers and will soon by AI. These things run on models that are fed data. GIGO applies.
Think we should have a nationwide data bank that is like the FED or BLS expanded to vet all data used for government programs.
1) I think I heard (Dr. Birx??) someone say yesterday that all deaths of people diagnosed with Covid-19 are being attributed to the virus, regardless of the person’s underlying other health issues, advanced age, etc.
2) I do not understand why there is not data (at least in our area) for RECOVERED. They are allowing people to think that all those who tested positive are still “sick”, when they may have recovered literally weeks ago. This must serve some leftist agenda, but seems patently dishonest, IMHO.
When the CV story first broke I noticed we weren't getting the same metrics we got with the flu.
With the flu they always told us it affected the old and those with compromised immune systems.
Even now, months after the first reports we're only now getting random data about who is affected and how. Now they're reporting blacks are most affected and this will of course become a political issue.
I've had questions about the reporting since the beginning. Either people are hesitant to report what they know or they simply don't know. And if they don't know why don't they know like they do with every other spread of a disease?
Were researchers caught off guard? If so, why?
There's a missing component to all of this.
I guess we have a general data problem that gets noticed when something like this occurs. We have become reliant on numbers and tend to believe models and computer results about a lot of things. We and I mean all of us including scientists and researchers, don’t admit they don’t know. Ignorance is a good reason to do nothing until you do know.
Anyone looked at the sources? The data on the website is not consistent with the sources. The data on the website appears to be higher than what’s shown from the sources.
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