Hope for improvement from the CDC

[mtbc]

A few weeks ago, the Associated Press reported that the CDC director announced plans to reorganize, probably next year, in addressing their failings with SARS-CoV-2. Thank goodness for that, it was strange for me as a layperson to be maybe even nearly a couple of years ahead of what the the official understanding seemed to be. I'm no expert, I was just reading case reports from American doctors, preprints from SE Asia, etc., but everything further has just confirmed the heart of those earlier indications. The CDC didn't have the WHO's excuse of having to pander to China. I may not be holding my breath but I am glad to see some on-target acknowledgement of a need to improve and intention to put measures in place to achieve that.

Comments

[aldabra]

I will be surprised if the aim of the restructuring is to improve the communication of risk. It seems to me that they are thoroughly captured by political interests.

[mellowtigger]

I too am feeling very pessimistic of what's to come. Biden's "Mission Accomplished" declaration against COVID means that we're all free to behave now as we did before the pandemic. He also announced anti-cancer efforts, but it means nothing because he's spreading SARS-CoV-2 which disrupts the immune system leading potentially to... cancers. I don't think the CDC will change Biden's mind, unless he does a magical 180-degree reversal immediately following good news on the upcoming election. (Which merely confirms that they always knew but chose their messaging based on selfish benefit.)

[thewayne]

They were definitely captured and controlled during the early days of Covid and they later tried to fight back against it. I think it's possible the CDC can be reformed - whether or not they will be reformed is another question entirely.

[mtbc]

Part of what the director said related to reversing some of the previous administration's changes.

[mtbc]

They hope to make information for the public more clear and discoverable but that, I think, is a different dimension from what you have in mind. (At least, from my perspective, they appeared to loudly and clearly say some plain-wrong things.)

[aldabra]

Yes. They loudly and clearly said plainly wrong things, and insufficiently many people believed them, and they have diagnosed the problem as insufficient loudness and clarity, and also public access to other sources of information. So they're dialling up the loudness and clarity and unanimity of plainly wrong things, and they will be surprised when we listen less.

The Trusted News Initiative, for example, has suppressed various inconvenient viewpoints which turned out to be right. Consequently I trust its sponsors, notably the BBC, way less than I otherwise would. You only get to claim to be trustworthy if you're right.

What I want from public health is precautionary messaging based on current knowledge with acknowledgement of gaps. We don't know yet whether it's airborne; we're looking into it; in the meantime try to stay away from people. What we got was gaslighting. I do not want louder clearer gaslighting.

I wonder whether this is inevitable when optimising-for-the-State leads to different outcomes from optimising-for-the-individual. Eat Out To Help Out was so blatantly putting lives at risk to restart the extractive economy that you have to wonder what the public health messaging was for.

[mtbc]

The CDC does also seem to intend to take other measures, like improving their responsiveness to discoveries by taking more account of preprints, etc., so at least it's not all about reporting. So I am at least encouraged by some acknowledgement that they got things wrong. You're quite right about gaps, of course, e.g., I don't know to what extent they were just blinded by conventional-wrong wisdom that hardly anything's much airborne, versus just finding convenient things in their bottoms.

I seem to talk to a few people who hold BBC news in fairly low regard and I haven't much drilled into those details, though I was differently disappointed with their pandemic coverage. With people's unhappiness with the NYT too I'm running low on convenient news sources. Though, of course, these days the BBC's all where's the coffin now? and here's somebody who glimpsed Her Majesty a few decades ago.

Eat Out To Help Out: absolutely. R. now has to go into the office a fair bit, not because her employer or job demand it, but because the city (maybe wider) will tax the employers hard if they aren't filling the offices plenty again.

The gaslighting toward normal appears to have worked out nicely for them, so far. I am curious if there will eventually be any accountability should long-term cumulative toll somehow become more apparent but I am not holding my breath.