The OHDSI study-a-thon group has a pre-print An international characterisation of patients hospitalised with COVID-19 and a comparison with those previously hospitalised with influenza. What is encouraging with this one over yesterday’s study, is multiple data sources and almost too many co-authors to count (take that Nature’s editors). So an opportunity to see the variation […]

Raghu Parthasarathy writes: I’ve been frustrated by Covid-19 pandemic models, for the opposite reason that I’m usually frustrated by models in science—they seem too simple, when the usual problem with models is over-complexity. Instead of doing more useful things, I wrote this up here. In his post, Parthasarathy writes: Perhaps the models we’re seeing are […]

Someone who wishes to remain anonymous writes: Here’s a joke we used to tell about someone in econ grad school, a few decades ago. Two economists were walking down the street. The first one says: “Isn’t that a $20 bill?” The second one says: “Can’t be. If it were, somebody would have picked it up […]

Last week we discussed the Santa Clara county study, in which 1.5% of the people tested positive for coronavirus. The authors of the study performed some statistical adjustments and summarized with a range of 2.5% to 4.2% for infection rates in the county as a whole, leading to an estimated infection fatality rate of 0.12% […]

This post is by Phil Price, not Andrew. There a couple of things that some people who comment here already know, but some do not, leading to lots of discussion in the comments that keeps rehashing these issues. I’m hoping that by just putting these here I can save some effort. 1. The ‘infection fatality […]

The talk will be sometime the morning of Wed 6 May in this seminar. Title: Some statistical issues in the fight against coronavirus. Abstract: To be a good citizen, you sometimes have to be a bit of a scientist. To be a good scientist, you sometimes have to be a bit of a statistician. And […]

The other day I wrote about the challenge in addressing the pandemic—a worldwide science/engineering problem—using our existing science and engineering infrastructure, which is some mix of government labs and regulatory agencies, private mega-companies, smaller companies, university researchers, and media entities and rich people who can direct attention and resources. The current system might be the […]

Seth Flaxman et al. have an updated version of their model of coronavirus progression. Flaxman writes: Countries with successful control strategies (for example, Greece) never got above small numbers thanks to early, drastic action. Or put another way: if we did China and showed % of population infected (or death rate), we’d erroneously conclude that […]

Joseph Candelora in comments pointed to this updated report on the Santa Clara study we discussed last week. The new report is an improvement on the first version. Here’s what I noticed in a quick look: 1. The summary conclusion, “The estimated population prevalence of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in Santa Clara County implies that the infection […]

I originally gave this post the title, “Stigler: The Changing History of Robustness,” but then I was afraid nobody would read it. In the current environment of Move Fast and Break Things, not so many people care about robustness. Also, the widespread use of robustness checks to paper over brittle conclusions has given robustness a […]

tl;dr: Their 95% interval for the infection rate, given the data available, is [0.7%, 1.8%]. My Bayesian interval is [0.3%, 2.4%]. Most of what makes my interval wider is the possibility that the specificity and sensitivity of the tests can vary across labs. To get a narrower interval, you’d need additional assumptions regarding the specificity […]

Kevin Lewis pointed me to this article. It seemed kinda familiar, I took a look at the abstract, and I realized . . . I reviewed this article for the journal! Here was my referee report: The paper seems fine to me. I have only two minor comments, both relating to the abstract. 1. I […]

1. The news! Zad’s cat, pictured above, is not impressed by this bit of cargo-cult science that two people sent to me: No vaccine or effective treatment has yet been found for people suffering from COVID-19. Under the circumstances, a physician in Kansas City wonders whether prayer might make a difference, and he has launched […]

Anthony Fowler wrote a wonderful op-ed. You have to read the whole thing, but let me start with his most important point, about “the temptation to overclaim” in social science: One study estimated the economic value of the people spared through social-distancing efforts. Essentially, the authors took estimates from epidemiologists about the number of lives […]

See here. Please share your reactions and suggestions in comments. I’ll be talking with Seth Flaxman tomorrow, and we’d appreciate all your criticisms and suggestions. All this is important not just for Italy but for making sensible models to inform policy all over the world, including here.

Carlos Ungil writes: The IHME released an update to their model yesterday. Using now a better model and taking into account the relaxation of mitigation measures their forecast for US deaths has almost doubled to 134k (95% uncertainty range 95k-243k). My [Ungil’s] charts of the evolution of forecasts across time can be found here. I […]

What’s new? The new and shiny reduce_sum facility released with Stan 2.23 is far more user-friendly and makes it easier to scale Stan programs with more CPU cores than it was before. While Stan is awesome for writing models, as the size of the data or complexity of the model increases it can become impractical […]

The University of Washington in Seattle is a big place. It includes the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME), which has produced a widely-circulated and widely-criticized coronavirus model. As we’ve discussed, the IHME model is essentially a curve-fitting exercise that makes projections using the second derivative of the time trend on the log scale. […]

Robin Lee writes: To check for linearity and homoscedasticity, we are taught to plot residuals against y fitted value in many statistics classes. However, plotting residuals against y fitted value has always been a confusing practice that I know that I should use but can’t quite explain why. It is not until this week I […]

Ivan Oransky points us to this amusing retraction of a meta-analysis. The problem: “Standard errors were used instead of standard deviations when using data from one of the studies”! Actually, I saw something similar happen in a consulting case once. The other side had a report with estimates and standard errors . . . the […]

After closing amid the coronavirus pandemic, the National Park Service is testing public access at several parks across the nation, including two in Utah, with limited offerings and services. Visitor centers and campgrounds remain largely shuttered at Bryce Canyon and Capitol Reef, but visitors are welcome at some of the sites.

Two legislative stalwarts lose endorsements as a wave of younger, more liberal challengers emerges in Minneapolis.

Bruising convention battle calls into question party unity behind the Peterson challenger.

The decision to shelve detailed advice from the nation's top disease control experts for reopening communities during the coronavirus pandemic came from the highest levels of the White House, according to internal government e-mails.

Returning Internal Revenue Service workers in Kansas City are being directed to a room well-stocked with face masks, while some other IRS offices were still telling staffers to buy or make their own as the Trump administration starts rolling out a location-based plan for returning more of the some 2 million federal workers to job sites.

It's the first Orioles game to be played there under a long-term partnership with the Naval Academy.

The fan-favorite outfielder abruptly left the team last week.

The Baltimore Orioles' Opening Day will be delayed by at least two weeks after Major League Baseball announced its response to the coronavirus outbreak Thursday.

Major League Baseball's teams have pledged $30 million for ballpark workers who will lose income because of the delay to the season caused by the novel...

The union representing 700 hospitality workers at Camden Yards is asking for financial help on what would have been opening day.

The journeyman's career saw a resurgence after he joined the Orioles. He went on to be the MVP of the 2018 World Series with the Boston Red Sox.

Baltimore Orioles' Trey Mancini announced Tuesday he is undergoing chemotherapy for Stage 3 colon cancer. 

The announcement follows MLB's decision that refunds could be issued.

Stephens, George May 20, 1953 - Apr 30, 2020 George L. Stephens, 66, Palmetto, Fl., died April 30, 2020. George was born and raised .....

Lynn, Coralyn Sep 4, 1930 - May 2, 2020 Coralyn Lynn, 89, of Sarasota, Florida, died on May 2, 2020. Funeral arrangements by: Your .....

Corbett, Sr., Randall Joseph May 1, 1943 - May 7, 2020 Randall Joseph Corbett, Sr., 77, of Plymouth, Massachusetts and Venice, Florida, died on .....

Cabott, Dorothy W. Jan 5, 1936 - May 5, 2020 Dorothy W. Cabott, 84, of Port Charlotte, FL, died on May 5, 2020. Funeral .....

Saturday's 14-race Florida Derby Day card gets under way at 11:30 a.m. from Gulfstream Park in Hallandale Beach, Fla., and the Grade 1 Derby will feature a full field of 3-year-olds competing for $750,000 and 170 qualifying points for the Kentucky Derby, now scheduled for Sept. 5 (100 points to the winner, 40 to second, […]

The post Triple Crown News Minute Presented By Kentucky Equine Research: Closer Look At Florida Derby Contenders appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

The team at I am Horse Racing would like to introduce our newest endeavor, a series entitled “Vet's Corner.” This new arm of our video and social media installments will focus on delving into many of the most common ailments, issues, and physical aspects associated with horses, sport horses, and racehorses. We will gather the nation's top minds to speak […]

The post I Am Horse Racing Helps Answer The Common Question: What Is Colic? appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

Ricardo Santana Jr., whose six-year streak as Oaklawn's leading rider was ended in 2019 by David Cohen, has been suspended the final 10 racing days of the 2020 race meeting at the Hot Springs, Ark., track for an incident involving Cohen in the stretch run of the seventh race on Sunday, April 5. Santana was […]

The post Elbow Room: Santana Suspended 10 Days By Oaklawn Stewards For Careless Riding appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

In a new video feature being introduced today, Paulick Report publisher Ray Paulick tries to answer questions that readers have submitted using the “Ask Ray” button at the top of the horse racing website's home page. Many recent “Ask Ray” questions have focused on re-scheduling of major races and the resumption of the sport in […]

The post Introducing Ask Ray: Impertinent Answers To Important Questions appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

There is no firm timeline in place for the resumption of racing at Parx, but when it does happen, it's going to look quite different. That's the word from Sal DeBunda, president of the Pennsylvania Thoroughbred Horsemen's Association in a video update posted on the group's Facebook page last week. DeBunda explained that Pennsylvania Gov. […]

The post Parx Has Several Hurdles To Clear Before Racing Can Resume appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

In the latest installment of Ask Ray, Paulick Report publisher Ray Paulick answers questions from readers on several topics, and it's apparent from his responses that he's a little edgy after being in isolation since mid-March. A question about why California workouts are almost all designated as “handily” while the rest of the country's workouts […]

The post Ask Ray: Workout Designations, DRF Mystery, Arizona ADW And Edgar Prado appeared first on Horse Racing News | Paulick Report.

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