Please don't stop. All ears.
hey Anthony!
I’m just thinking back to some of the basic tenets and methods that I saw CDC promote in that Atlanta chapter -
they generally divide up an internal office into branches representing the epidemiologists / health communications officers and the program support teams (data masters/health promotion and cooperative agreement/grant money ppl respectively) ...an office of the director heads them up
thats a generic layout but used widely -labs are separate and located on a specific campus
Disease surveillance is their intake of bio-statistical data regarding infectious outbreaks but they also maintain massive surveillance systems fed by states which contain many kinds of lifestyle / knowledge base and behavioral types of data so they can analyze trends and score peer reviewed publications for the staff - “program evaluations “ is built on this info so CDC can assess the efficacy of their pgms and the possible causal link relationship between CDC resources and outcomes (which are United. Nations / WHO aligned for what its worth) -
the data collection follows stringent protocols and always includes a transparent and sensible methodology in order to remove the potential for bias as much as possible - they also want that data to be “weighted “ .... statistically sound/representative of the specific populations that contributed to them.....that’s followed by an endless parade of employees and contractors performing their own meta-analysis on multiple systems /data sets so they can obtain the much coveted first author publication achievement and/or promote collaboration with states : tribes and territories (plus Intl ppl)
they have staff constantly advising states and providing “technical assistance “ for data collection, analysis and content expertise - I worked in a function like that after I spent my first 3-4 years getting acclimated
so my point is everything they do that has ANY practical value to us is based on the availability and integrity of the data ....and the data —belong to the states - CDC isn’t an enforcement agency and can’t tell anyone to do anything....they’re almost like the NCAA relying on member institutions participation and support
So - the data that would REALLY help guide decision making right now would center on what they typically obtain with little to no problem....
what is the nature of the disease -
how virulent is it?
Can the labs identify specific characteristics like unique proteins in the virus shell?
Can it mutate?
Has it mutated? (If so how quickly and how many strains are active now?)
What other factors could be present that may be helping it spread or vice Versa -
What does the established body of literature say about trends and mortality/morbidly/economic impact etc ?
And a whole lot more
my point is — they can’t move forward with any meaningful higher analysis and make many helpful recommendations if they ha e data that’s horribly inaccurate and always changing (like we have happening now)
they are including a wide swath of
guess work in the prevalence counts from the states too - makes no sense.....al they’re reporting cases but also saying those numbers include suspected cases as well as assumed cases - basically two types of data that could be anything or nothing at all -
and it’s not like they’re getting bad data and then states are making minor/academic type decisions on it —
they’re going forward into full blown emergency footing at a preposterously bad time ....states as I recall - are already under the Purview of FEMA - while strict repressive measures are being considered or have scaled back versions in place now ...., hinging on a crap shoot collection. of unreliable and constantly changing prevalence counts and death la attributable (but money is flowing at the problem for sure) -
Some of the suspect mortality reports were based on someone already having sarcoidosis or pneumonia (many are “elderly “) but once they pass away they some how get counted as Cvd19 anyway —
on a lesser scale I saw them do that with obesity related indicators and flu - etc ....look for a paper called “scientists behaving badly “ - it was my primer on some of that stuff when I arrived there in 2002)
They reorganized respiratory disease after I left there — it was placed under the vaccination portion of that division for what that’s worth )
There are some altruistic “true believers “ there that are highly valued champions of specific disease - esp in the chronic disease center where I worked .......but there are A LOT MORE typical USG employees who put in a solid 4-5 hours of work each day - and whatnot