Quote:
Originally Posted by oldtimes
I believe it was extensively over exaggerated as is everything the media reports on. I'm not saying it wasn't a major issue but the media hyped it well beyond the reality. Many people died but most people survived.
|
One of the problems is how people viewed and media reported outcomes. There is the binary view, dead/ not dead. and there is the severity view, hospitalized or dead view, and there is the range of outcomes, from had it not tested not severe to fever, in bed, positive test but no hospitalization, to hospitalized but not ICU, to ICU to dead. .. ie a finer range of outcomes though some harder to report than others, because of lack of reporting outside of controllable systems, such as hospitals and physician practices.
So if the controllable accurate reporting is sourced from the location of the most severe, what information bias does it show?
There are confounding issues though: Media advertising model for revenue competition, resulting in fear mongering for clicks, which is the worst, to disinformation groups from abroad, to data and statistics under uncertainty, because what the hospital data showed, is how the state public health systems instructed health systems to report, along with government payments for counts to support where health insurance systems would not. . .
So with something new, there is a lot of incomplete and customer perceived annoying survey questions, which after getting through an overwhelmed and stressed system. . . the patients didn't want to complete, but is a very, important part of evaluation and efficacy of the system. . . Likewise, many medical health record systems had to be modified for not containing enough data collection fields for electronically collecting NEW pandemic information.. .
So with something basically as new and complex as our current health system with recent technology, insurance payment processes, and systems not optimized with enough slack for a pandemic, both human, technology and health systems got overwhelmed,
and that all combined to create the fog of viral war of information.
So throw all those variables, which are NOT highly controllable,as well as social influences of medically unqualified reporting making statements for clicks, or otherwise, and the result is what we have today. . .
information and data chaos. . .
So, that's why the accurate science outcomes and knowledge will come years later, after research and controlled studies/analysis and genetics will show a much more accurate picture of the virus impacts and outcomes. . .
So although I have access through Coach K's research hospital system's information through her, this Sportsguy is focusing on trying to take reasonable steps to prevent getting sick, as its never fun to be sick, and trying to improve my health to better deal with any future adverse outcomes, whether from COVID 19 or any variant or other new virus, and not worry about sensationalized media, nor catnip media tidbits for the fear attracting human survival bias for clicks. . .
ie, reported that several people got covid while attending the golden globes. . . news worthy? not any more, because the report doesn't specify severity, therefore is just sensationalizing for clicks or views.
good luck weeding yourself off the media catnip for your prehistoric survivalist brain. . .
sportsguy