[salmon30salmon]

The response to her actions seem to be overkill. With that said, what she is accused of doing is illegal (especially downloading PII from the government).

Also, she is reaching far beyond her grasp. And sensationalizing quite a bit. I am sure she is intelligent and competent in her role, but that role is not that of an epidemiologist, data scientist or public policy expert. Why does this matter?

Well, focusing mainly on the public policy, nothing is cut and dry. Understanding how semi-dependent systems work together is incredibly complex. She is so heavily focused on COVID that she lacks the insight into all of the competing forces that make up a society. And yes, getting those forces wrong will also cost lives.

Finally, her dramatization of the number of deaths implies (as many people imply) that any actions (that are not blatantly unconstitutional) could appreciably decrease deaths. Outside of the island nations and China, deaths have a weak correlation with public policy. More suggestive correlations exist for population density (cases) and average age (deaths). And yes, there are outliers (Japan is older, Vietnam is denser) but there are even more outliers on the shutdown argument.

The reason this is myopic focus on lockdowns is dangerous is that if undermines the effective mitigation efforts that can help without ruining society. As soon as any leader attempts to ease anything you have the pearl-clutching "give me lockdown or give grandma death" crowd sensationally crying foul. Our ability for reasoned disagreement was a dead horse years ago, but Covid continues to beat it senseless.

[TameAntelope]

I'm confused -- what did she do that "reached beyond her grasp" or "dramatized" the number of COVID-19 deaths in Florida?

Edit: You're all over this comment thread, what relationship do you have to this story, if any?

[salmon30salmon]

No relationship. Just bored on a day off. I am passionate about Covid related topics because I am frankly concerned by the rhetoric around Covid. It boggles my mind that this has become so politicized and opposition is equated with homicidal disregard for human life.

There is also so much sensationalism around Covid that it's impossible to actually discuss. Mask compliance for example. I've heard so many times that if only dumbfuck America would mask up we'd be sitting pretty. Except the US has some oh the highest mask compliance of western nations. People talk about anti-lockdown protests as being pawns for the far right and hating science, yet these protests are not unique to the US or the Right.

Essentially our response to a pandemic has devolved into people shouting memes at one another while 30 million unemployed are liking up at food banks. It's fucking crazy

[Geminidog]

Just because someone is interested in a topic doesn't mean they're connected to the topic.

[mrhyyyyde]

Has a real interest in only this subject apparently: https://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=salmon30salmon

[salmon30salmon]

The message sent via emergency comms was quite dramatic. Her insistence that the numbers were being cooked with malice to justify reopening is also attributing to conspiracy that which could be explained by differing opinions on how to clean up messy data (if someone tested positive on vacation, will they count in their home state or Florida?)

[pbourke]

> Outside of the island nations and China, deaths have a weak correlation with public policy.

South Korea, Vietnam, Finland, Norway and Thailand are not island nations and yet have a rate of death an order of magnitude lower than the US.

[salmon30salmon]

South Korea is basically an island. Their only border is an impregnable military zone. Norway and Finland speak more to density than their geography.

But yeah, we need to learn what was different in Vietnam and Thailand. Vietnam is especially interesting, but it could be easily argued that one of their tools is unavailable here (forced detention at camps for the infected)