At 08:28 18/09/2020, BYRNE, DAVE S. wrote:
John Whittington is right re individual cases but cross case comparison - the comparative method - can help without ever providing exact predictions. So retrospectively it will be possible using tools like Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA) to explore what has happened where in relation to policy developments and timings. That of course will be after the fair.

Of course.  Any number of things will be possible retrospectively (i.e. 'with the benefit of hindsight'), but that doesn't help us now.  It will, however, obviously be of value in helping us plan and prepare for the next epidemic/pandemic, whether or not any of us are still around when it happens.

Prospectively, for the reasons I outlined I just don't see how one can sensibly model the effects of something (e.g. relaxations of 'measures') of which we have zero historical experience and really no (quantitative) theoretical basis.  If we tried, we would surely be doing little more than 'modelling guesses', wouldn't we?

Kind Regards,
John

From: email list for Radical Statistics <[log in to unmask]> on behalf of John Whittington <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, September 17, 2020 9:24 PM
To: [log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: "The modellers didn't predict this outbreak": Dido Harding
 
At 17:41 17/09/2020, John Bibby wrote:
>Is this true?  ... What predictions WERE made? .... What caused this
>- what was wrong? ........ What other questions are we missing?

Is it really a matter of 'wrong', rather than simply that it is not
really a mathematical ('modellable') issue?

With all the necessary/usual assumptions and caveats, modellers can
attempt to predict what effect particular changes in transmission
(i.e. 'R') (nationally or regionally) will have on disease incidence
and prevalence - but, to my mind, that's about it.

Beyond that, the modellers have exactly the same problem as
government - not knowing how behavior of people will respond to
attempts to relax or tighten (nationally of regionally) particular
measures intended to reduce transmission, and how the attempted
changes, and changed behaviour, will actually affect the (national or
regional) 'R' value.

As far as I can see, the only way to ascertain the effect of
particular changes is 'empirical' (aka 'suck it and see') - and even
that is probably next-to-impossible when all sorts of different
things are being relaxed and/or tightened (and in different places)
more-or-less simultaneously.

Kind Regards,

John

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