Does Health Policy Require Certainty?
Much of the public debate about the coronavirus pandemic has centered on the issue of data How much data do we have? How reliable are the data? How compatible are competing sets of data? Answering these questions is important not only for grasping the nature and scope of the pandemic but also for assessing our government's response to it. Put simply, data are vital not only to understand the virus scientifically but also to make informed decisions about how to act.