Florida, COVID-19: If data and stats weren't important, Florida wouldn't lie about them.

People I love very much live in Florida. My very favorite academic conference is held in Florida. I want Florida to flatten the curve.

But Florida is flattening the curve. Believe me when I say that I'm not trying to dunk on Florida, but Florida has provided me with prime material for statistics teaching. Timely material that illustrates weaponized data.

Some examples are more straightforward, like median and poor data visualization. Others illustrate a theme that I cover in my own stats class, a theme that we should all be discussing in our stats class: Data must be very, very powerful if so many large organizations work so hard to discredit it, manipulate it, and fire people who won't. You should also point out to your students that organizations working so hard to discredit are typically straightforward descriptive data, not graduate-level data analysis. 

1. Measures of Central Tendency

As of June 23, the median age of people newly diagnosed with COVID-19 in Florida dropped to 35. This provides an example of the median and why a simple measure of central tendency can be significant.

If you want to do a deep dive, check out this Twitter thread that offers suggestions for what this may mean:

THINK LIKE AN EPIDEMIOLOGIST:

What does it mean that the median age of new cases is dropping in some areas? I see three possible explanations, not all good. A thread on how to distinguish between them. 1/10

(Figure h/t @ScottGottliebMD) pic.twitter.com/Y6m45qoBL6

— Natalie E. Dean, PhD (@nataliexdean) June 23, 2020

More reporting on this data:

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/coronavirus/fl-ne-coronavirus-florida-younger-20200620-zdbyrk6h25cwxak5h74cchirke-story.html

2. Bad data visualization example, presented without commentary.

h/t: https://twitter.com/DannyPage/status/1275257081675698178

3. Hiding data you don't like, Part 1

This sounds so dramatic, but books will be written about how Florida lied about their data and attacked people trying to report good data. Specifically, the story of Rebekah Jones (follow her on Twitter: @GeoRebekah). Jones worked for the state of Florida, using GIS to map out and track the COVID outbreak. For more information, check out Jones's website. She was fired. She claims that she was fired because she refused to misrepresent the data. More information on Jones's exact allegations has been reported elsewhere. Since she was fired, she has used Twitter to share her criticism of how Florida has handled their data. She has lent her voice to whistle-blowers, who state that more data manipulation continues to happen behind Florida's scenes. She has also created her own dashboard to illustrate data from Florida.

For more famous instances of large organizations hiding/lying/conflict of interesting their data, see this blog post.

4. Hiding data you don't like, Part 2

Lessons: Operationalizing a variable, lying with data

Related to Ms. Jones's claims, Florida has further evidence that the state wants to manipulate COVID-19 data. They want to make a change that would potentially undercount people in ICUs. Change the field goal. Florida announced that it no longer wanted hospitals to stop reporting all people in ICUs. Instead, they were only to report people in ICUs who actually needed intensive-care. And not all the lazy lay-about who go to the ICU for kicks, I suppose. 

https://floridapolitics.com/archives/342565-florida-changes-icu-reporting

5. Hiding data you don't like, Part III

Death rates for COVID19 in Florida dipped before the 2020 presidential election. 

Why?

That timing is sus.

Here is the Yahoo News version of the story, and here is one from the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. The graph is from the Orlando Sentinel. 

6. Police raid of Rebekah Jones' house.

Per item 3 on this list, Rebekah Jones is a data whistle-blower. The government struck back by accusing her of sending out an email (via gov't servers, and hence, illegal) urging Florida DoH workers to also blow the whistle. How did they investigate this? By raiding her house and drawing guns on her and her partner and two children. 

Here is an article about the flimsy charges:

https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/2020/12/10/evidence-warrant-raid-rebekah-jones-cybersecurity-digital-rights-civil-liberties-whistleblower/3867058001/

Here are interviews with Rebekah Jones about the incident:

https://twitter.com/therecount/status/1336654180027600896

https://twitter.com/FirenzeMike/status/1336147080428052484

Here is footage of the raid:

https://twitter.com/GeoRebekah/status/1336065787900145665?s=20

7. Florida is changing the way it reports COVID deaths

The Miami Herald reported on a change in the way that Florida reports COVID deaths, a change that could deflate the number of COVID deaths. Specifically, Florida is no longer taking death data from hospitals in real-time. Instead, they are waiting for the deaths to be reported by coroners.

And to make this a double whammy of an example, the Herald created this great data viz to illustrate the discrepancy: