Covid-19 Threat Was Greatly Overestimated at Huge Cost
University of Cambridge Press: CONCLUSIONS
Sampling bias in coronavirus mortality calculations led to a 10-fold increased mortality overestimation in March 11, 2020, US Congressional testimony. . . . This article presented important public health lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic. Reliable safeguards are needed in epidemiological research to prevent seemingly minor miscalculations from developing into disasters. . . . Public health campaigns based on fear can have harmful effects, and the ethics of such campaigns should be reevaluated. People need to have a greater voice in a transparent process that influences public health policy during an outbreak, and educational curricula should include basic research methods to teach people how to be better consumers of public health information. The public should also be fully informed of the adverse impacts on psychological well-being, human rights issues, social disruption, and economic costs associated with restrictive public health interventions during a pandemic.
In closing, nations across the globe may fearfully anticipate future waves of the coronavirus pandemic, and look bleakly toward outbreaks of other novel viral infections with a return to severe mitigation measures. However, well-worn advice from a famous aphorism by the poet philosopher George Santayana should be borne in mind, which is relevant to public health lessons learned in this article: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.”
For summary of the research paper see: Source
No comments:
Post a Comment