Andrea Widberg has a good summary of how poor the virus models have been and also of the insane media response. The failure of the models to get anywhere close to accurate is consistent with my experience in the applied Earth sciences. Models can be created to demonstrate almost any point. Models are only as good as the input data and the experience and judgement of the modeler. Here is a short snippet from Ms. Widberg’s piece specifically on the media response:
“…COVID-19 has proven to be a brutal flu for those unlucky enough to get it. Any new disease that’s successfully left animals behind for human-to-human transmission is highly risky. Nevertheless, the current insanity gripping the world is based upon highly dubious computer models, making those models as dangerous as a virus.
On March 8, MSNBC’s Chris Hayes attacked Trump for trying to manipulate downwards the expert projections about COVID-19 deaths. One month later, Hayes was back, attacking Trump for intentionally manipulating the numbers upwards:
The most cynical interpretation of all this, one I can't quite bring myself to accept, is they rolled out the model showing 100k deaths after they knew it would be less than that so they could anchor everyone to that # and take a vicotry lap when "only" tens of thousands died. https://t.co/hYiUCHhO5g
— Chris Hayes (@chrislhayes) April 8, 2020
Hayes is an unprincipled moron who will say anything to hurt Trump but his monomania highlights how very wrong the original high-death predictions have proven to be…”