Perceptive citizens might have cause to wonder how the state of North Carolina could have gotten things so terribly wrong with regard to its response to the COVID-19 epidemic. We had written here recently regarding some of the reasons.
But I had the opportunity to participate in a conference call open to the state's physicians on Wednesday night. The objective was to have state health officials share with us up-to-date information regarding the response to COVID-19.
The call featured several speakers including the NC HHS Secretary, Dr. Mandy Cohen; her State Health Director, Dr. Elizabeth Tilson; and also Aaron McKethan, an academician with Duke University who has contributed heavily toward the modeling relied upon by the state. These models attempt to predict the severity of the epidemic in North Carolina. McKethan has a PhD in "public policy analysis", and is an assistant professor.
Particularly interesting were McKethan's comments. He presented several charts and graphs that I am unfortunately not able to reproduce here. But I will attempt to summarize.
He presented two different models that had been developed and forwarded to the state. One took place during early April; and another took place during the latter part of April.
It must be noted that certain assumptions must be built into these models in order for them to "work"; and to provide projections regarding how severely the epidemic will spread.
What were the assumptions?
The model published in early April assumed that each case of COVID-19 would spread to 25 other people. The latter model assumed that each case would spread to 10 other people.
Each model presented different scenarios that depended upon how infectious the virus is assumed to be. This measure of infectivity is called the "R" value; and McKethan presented several different possible ranges for this R value.
But here is the key point. He openly admitted that we do not know what the true numbers are. We do not know how many people are infected by each given case. And we do not know the true R value, which can theoretically change during the course of the epidemic.
He openly admitted, therefore, that there was a great deal of uncertainty with these models. It is not atypical that models of this type try to provide a worst possible case. But that is hardly ever the likely case.
He then presented a slide that depicted how the epidemic would progress, under these models, with the current social distancing requirements and executive orders issued by Governor Cooper; and how it would progress without these things. He showed that the model predicts a greater than 50 percent chance our hospital capacity would be exceeded if we did not have all the distancing requirements and executive orders.
It is quite interesting that there was one alternative he did not attempt to project. That alternative, of course, is quarantining cases and contacts; doing contact tracing; and urging the elderly and the medically vulnerable to stay home and isolated from others. That is the responsible "middle ground" that Cooper refuses to consider. That option is not even contemplated under the various models and scenarios presented.
But again, there is great uncertainty with the models utilized because of the "great unknowns" discussed above-- the number infected by each case, and the infectivity of the virus-- and he readily admits this. That is why the models should not be relied upon by Dr. Cohen and Governor Cooper in deciding the state's response to the epidemic. Instead, they should have been adhering to time-tested public health principles and methods and ethics that I have discussed here previously.
These models have been presented to the public as scientific and accurate. It has been asserted that Governor Cooper has been acting upon reliable scientific and medical input. But that is simply not true.
The approach they adopted has been very costly-- it has caused rampant unemployment way beyond the great recession 12 years ago; likely losses of significant numbers of small businesses; all the health and social effects associated with economic downturns, and with scaring people away from seeking medical care; and bread lines at food banks and food pantries.
Dr. Cohen spoke briefly. The most interesting thing she discussed is that she expects there might be a repeated cycle of loosening and tightening restrictions on the public. We tighten, and then we loosen, and then we have to tighten again, and then we loosen, etc. You get the idea. Her slide proclaimed, "May need to dial the dimmer switch up or down depending on Trends".
They are already contemplating forcing all this tyranny on the public-- again and again and again.
The entire slide presentation for all the speakers is found here.
The public needs to roundly reject the snake oil they are peddling.
Garbage in...Garbage out
Posted by: Fred Gregory | 05/08/2020 at 07:52 PM
Yep, Fred. But I have to admit-- at least the Duke professor was honest and forthright about that. The problem is Cooper, Cohen and those on the left who are pretending it is medical science that is guiding their decisions.
Posted by: Triad Conservative | 05/08/2020 at 08:27 PM