Deborah Birx, White House coronavirus response coordinator, showed charts on death estimates related to the coronavirus pandemic. © Jabin Botsford
Boston Globe/Washington Post: Experts, Trump’s advisers doubt White House’s 240,000 coronavirus deaths estimate
WASHINGTON - Leading disease forecasters, whose research the White House used to conclude that 100,000 to 240,000 people will die nationwide from the coronavirus, were mystified when they saw the administration's projection this week.
The experts said they don’t challenge the numbers’ validity but said they don’t know how the White House arrived at them.
White House officials have refused to explain how they generated the figure - a death toll bigger than the United States suffered in the Vietnam War or the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. They have not provided the underlying data so others can assess its reliability, and have not provided long-term strategies to lower that death count.
Some of President Trump’s top advisers have expressed doubts about the estimate, according to three White House officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly. There have been fierce debates inside the White House about its accuracy.
Read more ....
Update: Trump officials privately question White House coronavirus death toll estimate: WaPo (The Hill)
WNU Editor: So the people who made these models are the ones who initially approached the White House. They gave their model/predictions, that the White House then makes public. Almost immediately these statisticians then rush to the media questioning their own models, and are requesting anonymity?!?!?! This is outrageous! I say bring these people up to explain their models, anonymity be damned. The whole U.S. economy has been shut down based on their expert and scientific approach to predicting this crisis. Explanations have to be given starting with White House coronavirus response coordinator Deborah Birx, Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and last but not least those who made these models and predictions.
4 comments:
560 in NY alone in one day. times 30 1 month) is 16800. I'm taking into account of maybe it's going to go down but I doubt it.
16800 times 4 is 67200, that in NY is 4 months
I think it's going to be much much worse.
It all depends on how much this spreads and how well the health care system is able to handle it. If it's a Italy like situation, they will easy hit that number.
"If it's a Italy like situation, they will easy hit that number."
I respectfully disagree in part. Italy had the 4th oldest population for a country. Many of the people that died had co-morbidities such as obesity, hypertension, and diabetes. As you age you can get the latter two despite doing everything right. Arteries harden as we age so you would expect hypertension prevalence to go up in the older age groups even if they do everything right. Diabetes will go up even if people exercise, eat healthy meals and get enough sleep. Cells are not as efficient as we age.
The Italian doctors have reported to not list co-morbidities of patients if they do not desire to. It is not required by Italian regulations. However, if you are medical doctor or researcher it muddies the water. Statisticians and other professionals know how to tease out data where there is confounding, where you have effects due to more than 1 factors. If you least all the factors in a death certificate it is a great help.
Italy, With Aging Population, Has World’s Highest Daily Deaths From Virus - WSJ
I cannot find the news about the committee but I think it was set up 2015. Italy has had high death rates for a long time. (It is hard finding articles older than say 10 years because unless you have a professional web search, the way google and other do it is like you are being radar jammed.)
'Given Italy's older population, "you would expect their mortality rate to be higher on average, all else being held equal," compared with a country with a younger population, Gordon told Live Science.'
livescience.com/why-italy-coronavirus-deaths-so-high.html
"They gave their model/predictions, that the White House then makes public. Almost immediately these statisticians then rush to the media questioning their own models, and are requesting anonymity?"
This is how they hand the job losses around the presidents neck and not their own.
It is fair that a technical expert gives a best worst, average, and a most likely scenarios and let the elected official manage the risk and take the kudos or blame. Instructors with APICS or professors at university will teach you that forecasts are alsways WRONG, but they are useful. After a few to several periods or more the forecast will be off and have to be recalculated. There are methods of measuring the forecast error such as MAPE, MAD, MSE and others.
How come journalists do not ask what MAPE, MAD or MSE is?
It is very clear over the last generation that journalist have agendas and want to set the agenda. Many of them went to uni and yet they are innumerate. At uni you are suppose to get a well rounded education, but I guess this is not so @ J school, where they are ignorant of so much mathematics as to make almost every journalist an A-bomb of stupidity.
You model can be wrong several time periods out, but if it is not ballpark, then maybe you are not an expert?
www.apics.org
www.isixsigma.com/tools-templates/graphical-analysis-charts/making-sense-time-series-forecasting/
www.youtube.com/watch?v=H_N5_vxs8Tg
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