‘Australian study suggests kids aren’t corona spreaders’ – World Israel News

https://worldisraelnews.com/back-to-school-australian-study-suggests-kids-arent-corona-spreaders/

Interesting that the retort from another academic, criticising the study, also included this: “Is this the work of some politician somewhere who doesn’t like their own kids and don’t want them at home? I don’t know.” Well, obviously she doesn’t know, because it’s a rhetorical question she made up to add rhetorical force to her (perfectly reasonable) critique, and to personally attack the authors of the study by suggesting they are politically motivated. Scientists should leave this sort of junk to the politicians, except where they actually do know.

UN condemns “toxic lockdown culture in SA” and rightly so – this video displays immoral and incompetent policing. Why is this tolerated? This is not how to enforce. Thanks @News24 for covering

https://m.news24.com/SouthAfrica/News/un-human-rights-office-highlights-toxic-lockdown-culture-in-sa-20200428

And you have to ask what would have happened if there had been no filming.

Lancet systematic review: “Policy makers need to be aware of the equivocal evidence when considering school closures for COVID-19, and that combinations of social distancing measures should be considered”

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanchi/article/PIIS2352-4642(20)30095-X/fulltext ‘School closure and management practices during coronavirus outbreaks including COVID-19: a rapid systematic review’

The Lancet Child and Adolescent Health, VOLUME 4, ISSUE 5, P397-404, MAY 01, 2020

Which epidemiologist do you believe? Asks @freddiesayers of @unherd

https://unherd.com/2020/04/which-epidemiologist-do-you-believe/

And as well as asking this, he provides a nice analysis. “…right in spirit, wrong on numbers” is something that I’ve tried to account for in my model of good epidemiological prediction. In no other field of knowledge besides forecasting do we so easily accept accuracy to indicate knowledge. In no other field do we suffer so severely from a lack of tools to distinguish knowledge from lucky guess. Now we are seeing that I think.

2 contrary views: Imperial vs Sweden – with thanks to @JasonFMitchell #epitwitter

Swedish expert: why lockdown is the wrong policy: https://unherd.com/podcasts/swedish-expert-why-lockdowns-are-the-wrong-policy/

Imperial’s Neil Ferguson defends lockdown strategy: https://unherd.com/podcasts/imperials-neil-ferguson-defends-lockdown-strategy/

Was pointed to this interesting website by Jason Mitchell – seems great.

COVID on the Breadline documentary – 7 min and 30 min versions in one place

Documentary showing the reality of lockdown for the world’s poor

7 min version (low res, suitable for whatsapp etc)

COVID on the Breadline. Short version from PICTURING HEALTH on Vimeo.

30 min version

COVID on the Breadline from PICTURING HEALTH on Vimeo.