> I have some more questions (serious)
Contact the department of health education of the ministry of health. You already paid for it with your taxes, might as well make use of it.
Yeah I've done that two or three times about different things. One time I got an answer, the other (reporting an outdated page) an automated reply five days later that they're too busy. I don't expect they have time for in-depth questions about research that's not even a month old. Thanks for the tip though!
Point being, it's not that straightforward unless there's someone you already know that is willing to share their contact information and they actually have the time to talk to you.
I totally see the point about going for second-best first until you know you have a question worth their time and not something that's obvious. (Although the answer in this case did seem obvious to me as a software person, or at least I'd have guessed they can see the amount of anti-covid-stuff dropping at different rates.)