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And as always, there's a danger in translating scientific conclusions into advice for individuals regarding personal behavior.
In the US today, there are millions, maybe tens of millions of people walking around who think they've already had the virus. Many of them are correct. Many of them are mistaken. Most of them haven't been tested.
So public consumption messaging around post-infection immunity has to be qualified for that reason as well, since if you tell people they're 100% safe after they've been infected, a lot of people who haven't actually had the virus are going to conclude they're in the clear.
It's a really hard question—how to convey information to the public in such a way as to prioritize accuracy and transparency while minimizing the chances of misuse of the data. There isn't an easy answer.
It's not inappropriate for Silver to highlight the fact that the evidence of post-infection immunity seems to be trending in a positive direction. But his "a lot of high-information news consumers seem to think the evidence for immunity to COVID is iffy, but" isn't useful.
Particularly since the very next clause in the tweet, "there are uncertainties," underscores the fact that many scholars believe the evidentiary question HASN'T been conclusively resolved.
I suspect Silver would say that "iffy" implies more radical doubt than "uncertainty," and yeah, as a copyeditor, sure. They're distinct. Fine. But both are mushy terms, and contraposing them like this is demanding a LOT of work from that distinction.
Silver has made a lot of hay over the years dunking on conventional wisdom, and he's been right more than he's been wrong. But that kind of dunking has specific consequences when you're tweeting about the public response to a global pandemic.
I'm as certain as I can be without a test. (Feb 25) We had positive cases 45 miles to either side of me, I had three plausible places I could have got it, and my symptoms were absolutely textbook. But they don't HAVE the tests. I tried to report my likely case to no avail.
How can we trust anything when that's how it's being handled? I have to assume that if my situation is common that I may have had it, the world may never know, and there are likely more. I don't think this makes ME safe, I think this makes US unsafe.
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