It came into our hands in Hello forum government document, on the basis of which MPs are to decide on a state of emergency tomorrow.
It is unbelievable that this document, which was supposed to be prepared by the independent and, above all, apolitical state institute ÚZIS, is full of manipulations and claims without evidence. At the same time, it is scandalous that MPs are using it to make decisions about 10 million people in this country.
We bring you a fundamental analysis from a mathematician from the Department of Mathematical Analysis and Applications of Mathematics at Palacký University in Olomouc.
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84 pages of manipulation
RNDr. Tomáš Fürst, Ph.D.
I don't know why the ÚZIS is doing this, but the material with which it apparently wants to ensure the extension of the state of emergency is a parade of impressions, feelings, manipulations, and misleading claims. The ÚZIS should be an apolitical body that provides expert input for political decisions. Instead, it is trying to manipulate lawmakers into extending the state of emergency without providing them with any evidence of its effectiveness. In school we called it „proof by contradiction.“ Here are my quick comments on the most glaring errors in the file.
Government-secret presentation
1) Talk of a British mutation would be more credible if it were based on measured data, not simulations. The only measured data is on slide 7 (only dozens of sequenced samples in each region!). The percentage of the British mutation in the Hradec Králové Region is smaller than the percentage in the Moravian-Silesian Region. Yet this mutation is used to justify the increase that affected the Hradec Králové Region, but did not occur in the Moravian-Silesian Region. This is gross manipulation.
2) Slide 8 is pure manipulation. It does not in any way imply the dominance of a new type of virus (this data is not there at all). The arrows with the effects of measures are manipulative. There is no evidence that the decrease in January was an effect of the measures of 28.12. The fact that the increase in R to 1.3 was an effect of the British mutation is pure speculation that is not supported by data (see point 1).
3) The red text on slide 9 is just speculation. There is no evidence of a causal relationship.
4) The graphs on slides 10 and 11 would be more credible if there were data on the prevalence of the British mutation. But there is no such data, all we have is slide 7, which contradicts these figures. If we are justifying all these drastic measures with the British mutation, why are we not properly measuring its prevalence?
5) The claim on slide 14 that "measures prevented a risky uncontrolled escalation of the spread of the infection" is just speculation. There is no evidence of a causal relationship.
6) The prediction on slide 16 is pure manipulation. The model used has been criticized many times. The slide creates a false impression that the model works (the red and yellow lines match in historical data). However, this is achieved by adjusting the parameters back so that „it works“ (overfitting). The model's ability to predict anything has been disproven many times. The prediction of over 35 thousand cases per day is absurd, nothing like this has ever happened anywhere, it corresponds to an increase of 350 cases per 100 thousand inhabitants, which is a number that never observed anywhere in the world since the beginning of the epidemic, even in countries that did not take any measures. It's just a scaremongering, it's virtually certain that nothing like this would happen. This "prediction" is on the level of spreading alarmist news.
7) Slide 17 is exceptional because it contains no manipulation.
8) Slide 19 is pure speculation. It is possible that the lower incidence of the disease in Moravia is a result of greater contamination from earlier waves that affected Moravia more. Slide 23 is the same manipulation. A categorical statement about causality that is not supported by data. 24 ditto. Causality cannot be proven by writing it on many slides („proof by strong claims“).
9) Slide 27 is extremely interesting (note the different scales on the y-axis). The numbers are correctly normalized to 100 thousand inhabitants. If the intensity of contacts were as strong a predictor as the government needs to claim, it would have to be quite obvious that the epidemic is spreading much more in cities, where the intensity of contacts is logically greater, than in smaller towns. According to the graph, however, The dynamics of the disease throughout the entire period (whether there was a lockdown or not) was almost identical in municipalities with up to a thousand inhabitants and in cities with over 100 thousand inhabitants. This is strong evidence against the fact that the dynamics of the epidemic depend so strongly on the intensity of contacts.
10) The entire following section, slides 28–39, demonstrates that lockdown reduces population mobility. This is certainly true. The question is to what extent the reduction in population mobility is related to the dynamics of the disease (see point 9).
11) The graph on slide 31 directly shows that the lockdown has no effect. If there were no red vertical line in the graph, no one would know from the data that any measures were announced there.
12) The slide on page 41 shows that the number of new infections peaked in early March. The effect of the lockdown can be seen at the earliest a week after it began. So the epidemic was already slowing down in the second half of February. Why? This slide is direct evidence that the curve reversal could not have been the result of measures.
13) Slide 45 talks about less than 10 thousand cases in schools since the beginning of the epidemic. That is one percent of all infections! The government has disrupted the education system (about 2 million students at all levels) because of one percent of all infected people? Moreover, the risk of death from COVID in the age category under 25 is lower than the risk of suicide. This is probably not even taken seriously.
14) Slide 47 is funny. Before the school closures, there were supposedly 150 „clusters“ per week (average cluster size is 4 people) in schools in February. After the school closures, that dropped to 25 „small outbreaks“ (no longer „clusters“) in schools. How can there be 25 clusters in schools that are closed?
15) Slide 49 is again a manipulation. In reality, the numbers of infected children/teachers move in proportion to the overall development of the epidemic. When we look at the proportions of infected children/teachers, there is no clear effect of the measures. Slide 50 is therefore again a manipulation. Same as slide 56.
16) The table on slide 67 shows that the proportion of infected people in education is negligible and does not differ significantly when schools are closed and when they are open (September, all schools open, 2.6%, March, all closed, 1.3%). By closing all schools Will we only achieve a decrease in infections in education by half? This table shows that the vast majority of infections are from work, home and family, even when schools are open (June, September, December). The rest is below 5%. This is clear evidence of the pointlessness of these measures.
17) From slide 70 onwards, the material no longer even tries to present itself as a data basis for decision-making, and a direct appeal begins to be made that the measures need to be extended.
18) The predictions on slides 71, 72, 75, 76, 81, 82 and 84 are absolutely worthless, they have the same weight as if the director of the Institute of Health and Social Sciences had drawn them with a mouse in a paintbrush. The model of the Institute of Health and Social Sciences is not capable of prediction, the people from the Institute of Health and Social Sciences know this themselves, and that is why they write in italics under all these pictures that there is actually no prediction at all. It is pure manipulation.
Overall, I conclude that the material contains no evidence that the measures taken are working. On the other hand, it contains quite a lot of evidence that this is not the case. The material is a display of manipulation, categorical statements without evidence, misunderstanding, erroneous judgment, pressure and the spread of alarmist reports. The only purpose for which this material can serve is as a basis for the immediate dismissal of the director of the ÚZIS.
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