After more than a year and a half of the pandemic, one has to question the rationale of anti-vaxxers and libertarian spokespeople over their stance on COVID vaccination and other government-imposed restrictions. When it comes to protecting public health and our communities, the amassed data from legitimate sources appears to me to objectively justify most of these preventive measures. There is no attempt to cherry pick the data in order to defend one’s position in support of these measures, no matter how draconian one thinks they are. Take the data coming out of the U.S.
According to data by Johns Hopkins University, COVID-19 has killed over 750,000 Americans, including about 50,000 announced since the start of October, and infected about 46.5 million in the U.S. since last January. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimate that as many as 1 in 3 people in the U.S. have been infected, more than three times the official count. For the month of June, the coronavirus was responsible for 337 deaths a day. For comparison, the historic average deaths from gunshots, car crashes and complications from the flu add up to 306 a day. According to data from a CDC study released in October, men overall were 1.6 times likelier to die of the disease caused by the coronavirus than women. The study further indicated that men aged between 45 and 64 were more than 1.8 times likelier to die of a disease caused by COVID-19. In addition, the study concluded that for the most vulnerable groups, Blacks and Hispanics or Latinos, death rates are six times higher than those for white people.
Since the start of November, recorded coronavirus case levels have remained stable, with around 70,000 new infections reported daily. Thanks to the vaccine, hospitalizations and deaths have continued to decline. It is estimated that seventy percent of American adults are now fully vaccinated. In July of this year, the CDC reported on preliminary data from several states over the previous months which suggested that 99.5 percent of deaths from COVID-19 in the U.S. were among unvaccinated people. According to a recent analysis published by researchers at Yale University and the Commonwealth Fund, COVID-19 vaccinations in the U.S. have already prevented roughly 279,000 deaths and 1.25 million hospitalizations. The same report goes on to suggest that without vaccines, COVID-19 would still be topping cancer and heart disease as the leading cause of death in the U.S. today.
All of the above are not just statistics, for each number unfortunately represents individuals affected directly by COVID-19. One can argue about measures taken to prevent further new cases, hospitalizations and associated deaths, but one cannot dispute the facts. As a former analyst, data and information gathered from reputable and verifiable sources is one’s bread and butter. By analyzing the data, one begins to build an inventory of knowledge about the issues being researched. This analysis provides the basis for understanding the key facts surrounding those issues, and in turn helps decision makers to develop the appropriate policies. Being a mostly objective process, one always attempts to limit the impact of any subjective values and prevent “confirmation bias”. Moreover, verifiable and objective data doesn’t lie.
There will always be those who will attack public health policies for a variety of reasons, including arguments based on libertarian values. However, they cannot dispute the continuing realities of the real human impact caused by the pandemic. We can only measure whether the negative impacts are being reduced or increased by our policies. This is why decision makers need reliable, valid and consistent data as soon as it becomes available in order to justify their policies. In the case of COVID-19, such data now exists.
FROLITICKS 
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