Monday, April 13, 2020

Predictive Articles

A few weeks ago, a co-editor and I wrote about COVID-19. I myself wrote a second article, which a publisher preferred not to publish. These articles were written on 21 and 27 March. We and I said various things, some of which were not being discussed at the time, but are widely discussed now, and even implemented:
 We don't have meaningful statistics
 Population wide testing is impractical
 We need unbiased samples
 This will likely reveal a lower fatality rate *
 We need an exit strategy
 This will be risk-based
 It will restore economic life
 It will serve emotional needs
 It will be applied before the danger passes
And so on. Incidentally the 21 March article (for Philosophical Investigations 23 March) was re-published by the Gatwick City Times (7 April). OBSERVATION: But a few weeks ago, our ideas were fairly out of step. Now they are all over, except perhaps for the second-last point. And we still don't have meaningful statistics.

* The latest statistics from Germany (Statista) show that COVID-19 was present in 0.103% of fatalities under 60. According to other statistics (Deutsche Welle), 84.6% of infections were missed. That may reduce 0.103% to 0.016%. This does not appear to include primary cause of death (was it COVID-19 or something else?)  In Africa, it is obviously significant that most countries have a median age of 20 and under.

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