Jim Mason
May 19, 2021

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Yes, it's important to look at ("the") data, but data can be hard to interpret. What you have shown is a snapshot "accurate as of 18th May 2021", and it depicts deaths per capita only in relationship to the extent of lockdowns. So it can be misleading in at least two ways: (1) What are the values with time as a variable? For instance, India may be fairly low now, but maybe per capita deaths there are accelerating rapidly. (2) What are the effects of variables other than lockdown rules? Such things as population demographics, weather, distributions of indoor social gatherings by size and frequency, and even rates of compliance with lockdown rules may all have effects.

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Jim Mason
Jim Mason

Written by Jim Mason

I study language, cognition, and humans as social animals. You can support me by joining Medium at https://jmason37-80878.medium.com/membership

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