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GidMK's profile
Health Nerd
Health Nerd
Health Nerd
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@GidMK

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Health NerdVerified account

@GidMK

Epidemiologist. Writer (Guardian, Observer etc). "Well known research trouble-maker". PhDing at @UoW Host of @senscipod Email gidmk.healthnerd@gmail.com he/him

Sydney, New South Wales
theguardian.com/profile/gideon…
Joined November 2015

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    1. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      21/n Of note, however, the author makes a classic statistical error in dichotomizing age into two buckets We now know that the risk from age is CONTINUOUS, and so looking at the arbitrary cutoff of 70 years will lead to an erroneous resultpic.twitter.com/EBQ3MVCLXT

      2 replies 9 retweets 75 likes
      Show this thread
    2. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      22/n The author also makes the interesting claim that the WHO has estimated an infection rate of 10% of the world, referencing a recent news reportpic.twitter.com/yup98Ftm2Q

      1 reply 4 retweets 40 likes
      Show this thread
    3. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      Health Nerd Retweeted Marc Bevand

      23/n However, as @zorinaq has pointed out, this is simply bad reporting, with the WHO arguing that LESS THAN 10% of the world is likely infected This is, perhaps, an issue with relying on headlines in a scientific paperhttps://twitter.com/zorinaq/status/1314160523613593600?s=20 …

      Health Nerd added,

      Marc Bevand @zorinaq
      The media claimed "about 10% of the global population may have been infected by the coronavirus"—eg. https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2020/10/05/920453483/10-of-global-population-may-have-contracted-the-coronavirus-who-says … I investigated the claim. It's false. Bad reporting In reality "LESS than 10%" & in many situations it's "WELL UNDER 10%" of the general population 1/n
      Show this thread
      4 replies 6 retweets 78 likes
      Show this thread
    4. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      24/n There are, sadly, further errors in the paper. The author repeats a common myth, that t-cells mean that the threshold for herd immunity is much lower than usually estimatedpic.twitter.com/q1sPO5voVd

      2 replies 9 retweets 64 likes
      Show this thread
    5. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      Health Nerd Retweeted Prof. Shane Crotty

      25/n Interestingly, Ioannidis here cites @profshanecrotty, who has a great thread on why this interpretation is incorrecthttps://twitter.com/profshanecrotty/status/1313580981341712386?s=20 …

      Health Nerd added,

      Prof. Shane Crotty @profshanecrotty
      1/ Our new perspective piece on “Crossreactive memory T cells and herd immunity to SARS-CoV-2”is out now. @mlipsitch @yonatan @SetteLab @ljiresearch @NatRevImmunol https://www.nature.com/articles/s41577-020-00460-4 … pic.twitter.com/2cea1xIIzr
      Show this thread
      1 reply 12 retweets 86 likes
      Show this thread
    6. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      26/n Now, I actually think that all of these errors are a real shame, because the final parts of the commentary are both interesting and worth considering

      3 replies 5 retweets 50 likes
      Show this thread
    7. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      27/n The basic idea is that, rather than thinking about the next few months, we should be designing policies based on what will likely happen over the next 5-10 YEARS This is a good point, and not made often enough!

      1 reply 13 retweets 97 likes
      Show this thread
    8. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      28/n Short-term lockdowns made sense in the early days of the pandemic, but given the months since it is perfectly reasonable to suggest that there may be better ways to manage the disease moving forward

      1 reply 7 retweets 57 likes
      Show this thread
    9. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      29/n For example, from a GLOBAL perspective, I think that there may certainly be places in which heavy long-term restrictions do not make that much sense

      2 replies 5 retweets 44 likes
      Show this thread
    10. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      30/n Nigeria, for example, has a median age of 18 years. Less than 10% of the population is over 55. Given how much lower the risk is for younger people, harsher restrictions may not make as much sensehttps://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.07.23.20160895v6 …

      1 reply 7 retweets 52 likes
      Show this thread
      Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

      31/n Conversely, the U.S. has a much older population, on average, and thus is at far greater risk from COVID-19 generally

      5:31 PM - 11 Oct 2020
      • 6 Retweets
      • 49 Likes
      • Reader_RPS Superkalifragilistin_Interstellar_Borisov🌸 Mela Eckenfels Kausik Barbara Looten Beardykenobi Ingo Heuschkel 🔴🔴🔴 Jasmin vom Walde Noel O Connor🐄🐑
      1 reply 6 retweets 49 likes
        1. New conversation
        2. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          32/n That being said, this piece appears to use inappropriate evidence, misleading comparisons, and generally underestimate the risk/impact of COVID-19, which makes it problematic as a resource

          3 replies 7 retweets 66 likes
          Show this thread
        3. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          33/n As one final example, the author makes this statement in the conclusion, that measures taken to halt the pandemic are essentially destroying the world The reference? His own opinion piece in the Boston Readerpic.twitter.com/yUsFmyAWEO

          8 replies 8 retweets 84 likes
          Show this thread
        4. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          34/n I just checked, and Ioannidis cites himself 8 times in this paper, with 4 of those references being media or commentary articles

          3 replies 9 retweets 98 likes
          Show this thread
        5. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          35/n Oh also, on another note, given the relatively few meta-studies on COVID-19 IFR, it appears that the authors that Ioannidis here describes as "inexperienced" and "overtly wrong" are me and @LeaMerone Academic civility!pic.twitter.com/CRV0VElQfh

          8 replies 10 retweets 89 likes
          Show this thread
        6. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          36/n I should also note - some people have pointed out that the actual numbers in this review are almost certainly inaccurate (e.g. 1.5 mil COVID-19 deaths over 5 years is probably impossible) but I have not focused on the numbers themselves...

          1 reply 1 retweet 25 likes
          Show this thread
        7. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          37/n ...thing is, the numbers are largely a result of the assumptions. If you extrapolate out an assumed incorrectly low death rate then you'll find the numbers are low Therefore, I focused on the assumptions, because the numbers themselves are just a consequence of these

          1 reply 1 retweet 26 likes
          Show this thread
        8. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 11 Oct 2020

          38/n That being said, it is absolutely worth pointing out that some of these figures that the paper has postulated as reasonable are extraordinarily unlikely and show how the errors have caused a misleading result (remember, this is globally over 5 years!)pic.twitter.com/GoFDd6x2Rn

          5 replies 3 retweets 36 likes
          Show this thread
        9. Health Nerd‏Verified account @GidMK 13 Oct 2020

          39/n Also, because a lot of people seem confused about this point - here is why it is nonsense to suggest that because people may have had a comorbidity that COVID-19 didn't kill themhttps://medium.com/@gidmk/covid-19-deaths-are-mostly-caused-by-coronavirus-2a6d2d43bd09 …

          5 replies 9 retweets 47 likes
          Show this thread
        10. End of conversation

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