Sunday, July 26, 2020

Why Many People Doubt the Authorities About COVID

7/25/20 Florida Sun-Sentinel:

An error by the Florida Department of Health produced a COVID-19 positivity rate for children of nearly one-third, a stunning figure that played into the debate over whether schools should reopen.


A week after issuing that statistic, the department took it back without explanation. The next weekly report on children and COVID-19 showed the rate had plunged to 13.4%.

The department blamed a “computer programming error” for the mistake, in response to questions from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Experts said the change and the failure to explain it to the public calls into question the state’s data at a time when accurate and trustworthy information is crucial to a society grappling with an unprecedented health crisis.
So are they updating the software this frequently?  I would think this a pretty simple piece of code.  I suspect this was a mistake, not intentional fraud.  But there are so many examples of inflating the death counts that you can see why so many people tell the joke that ends with, "I'm from the government, and I am here to help you."

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