This very slick website presents what appears to be a research report using the language of randomly controlled trials, even talking about "assigning" countries to the control group or the treatment group.
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We don't say randomized controlled trial, defenders of the website protest. We say country-randomized controlled trial, and that's a different thing. How many members of the public will know the difference? This is designed to confuse.
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So what is a country-randomized controlled trial? It seems to be something *made up* entirely for this article. I did a searches on
@google, Google scholar,@webofscience, and@scopus. The term "country-randomized controlled trial" has NEVER been used prior to this article.Show this thread -
Meanwhile the website's authors have recognized that they overstepped with their "assignment" language, and are rapidly backtracking—without the sort of changelog that any preprint server or reputable scientific outlet would require. Compare versions from 12 hours ago with now:pic.twitter.com/UrHOSEaYEL
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Given the aggressive misuse of randomized controlled trial terminology—a mistake no public health professional would make—and the subsequent half-retreat without notification, I find it extremely hard to see how this could be anything other than a deliberate attempt to confuse.
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I've deleted 3 previous tweets. I had expressed dismay that the old versions of this website had disappeared from the Wayback Machine, and speculated about a DMCA takedown effort. It appears I was wrong.
@waybackmachine director@MarkGraham explains:https://twitter.com/MarkGraham/status/1292202125074735104 …Show this thread
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This is why I stay up late
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Something interesting I didn't realize until this commentary from Fauci a few weeks ago--even for a deadlier virus like Ebola, without adequately large properly controlled trials (which were not conducted for years), therapies were difficult to identifyhttps://twitter.com/covidpath/status/1284658176328003584 …
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Just stop.
End of conversation
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