Re:R number for UK below 1 for first time since August
by tialaramex on Saturday November 28, 2020 @06:59AM
(#25237050)
The year 2020 isn't over as we write this, so of course your hypothesis is technically possible. In the final weeks of the year US death rates could fall through the floor compared to normal.
But that's not a hypothesis about the existing data, that's a guess about the future, and probably not a very good one.
This presentation masqueraded as an analysis of existing data, and the existing data shows a big rise in excess deaths. A competent analysis ought to at the very least point out this discrepancy and try to address it.
The alternatives are the author wasn't aware that excess deaths statistics are available or worse they were aware those statistics contradicted their thesis and decided to hope the audience didn't know.
Somebody else has linked one of the sites that charts US death figures. They are not subtle. In some countries you have to squint to see any impact from COVID-19, because the data is noisy and their population is small. (And maybe their reaction was effective, we can say this is the case for New Zealand but less clearly for say, Finland). But for the US it's an obvious anomaly, a prolonged excess over months.
But that's not a hypothesis about the existing data, that's a guess about the future, and probably not a very good one.
This presentation masqueraded as an analysis of existing data, and the existing data shows a big rise in excess deaths. A competent analysis ought to at the very least point out this discrepancy and try to address it.
The alternatives are the author wasn't aware that excess deaths statistics are available or worse they were aware those statistics contradicted their thesis and decided to hope the audience didn't know.
Somebody else has linked one of the sites that charts US death figures. They are not subtle. In some countries you have to squint to see any impact from COVID-19, because the data is noisy and their population is small. (And maybe their reaction was effective, we can say this is the case for New Zealand but less clearly for say, Finland). But for the US it's an obvious anomaly, a prolonged excess over months.