[DocSavage87]

This:

"Some scientists fault the public for not heeding public health recommendations, but these folks miss the point. How you communicate your message and the sustainability and uptake of your message are part of the intervention itself, and you must be judged by what is achieved."

Like judging the person who puts out the punch for it being undrinkable, after someone else goes and pees in it.

I don't think that example is a good one. I also don't totally agree with the idea that the presenter is totally responsible for the uptake of the message. I do think the communication from the scientists has been muddled by the normal and healthy disagreements that exist among them. However, I think it has also been much damaged by the presentations "talking down" to the American people. Presenting strategies for mitigation with little or no explanation of "Why this strategy" has been very destructive. When things don't work for perfectly understandable reasons, people lose trust if they don't know those reasons. Why are the color tiers in California what they are? Nobody knows, including the County Health Officers who have complained about that fact. Things like this are a self-inflicted wound. However, it is also not a presentation by scientists. It is a political policy. Are the scientists at fault here for not insisting on full disclosure? I think they are, but it isn't entirely their call.

In short, we are often asked to believe Fauci and ignore Trump because of who they are, not because of the reasoning presented in what they say. That is never a good thing.

We're in this situation because of a lack of national leadership.  There was a brief effort to roll out some national plan, back when there was such a thing as a federal coronavirus task force, but the CDC and fed policy making is absent for this whole pandemic.  You complain about the presentation when the game plan for the pandemic was always to have a unified national front and get all the people on board with strong CDC recommendations reinforced and tailored by each state.  That was the game plan.  Nobody gamed out that POTUS would be actively undermining the effort.  You could run a billion simulations and never consider that possibility.  Nobody gamed out that POTUS would actively champion HCQ+AZM as a cure so COVID-19 was no big deal.  All of this nit picking about how scientists failed and not considering the order of magnitude worse problem caused by the White House is frankly incredibly flawed analysis.

When it comes to public health care that requires the support of the people, having a unified public message is the NUMBER ONE priority.  There is no way we could've succeeded during this pandemic with the Trump administration.  It was a non-starter.  Even if the scientists had done everything 100% by the book, there would be chaos and conflicting messages, which has been a hallmark of this Administration.

[DocSavage87]

This:

"Some scientists fault the public for not heeding public health recommendations, but these folks miss the point. How you communicate your message and the sustainability and uptake of your message are part of the intervention itself, and you must be judged by what is achieved."

Like judging the person who puts out the punch for it being undrinkable, after someone else goes and pees in it.

I don't think that example is a good one. I also don't totally agree with the idea that the presenter is totally responsible for the uptake of the message. I do think the communication from the scientists has been muddled by the normal and healthy disagreements that exist among them. However, I think it has also been much damaged by the presentations "talking down" to the American people. Presenting strategies for mitigation with little or no explanation of "Why this strategy" has been very destructive. When things don't work for perfectly understandable reasons, people lose trust if they don't know those reasons. Why are the color tiers in California what they are? Nobody knows, including the County Health Officers who have complained about that fact. Things like this are a self-inflicted wound. However, it is also not a presentation by scientists. It is a political policy. Are the scientists at fault here for not insisting on full disclosure? I think they are, but it isn't entirely their call.

In short, we are often asked to believe Fauci and ignore Trump because of who they are, not because of the reasoning presented in what they say. That is never a good thing.

We're in this situation because of a lack of national leadership.  There was a brief effort to roll out some national plan, back when there was such a thing as a federal coronavirus task force, but the CDC and fed policy making is absent for this whole pandemic.  You complain about the presentation when the game plan for the pandemic was always to have a unified national front and get all the people on board with strong CDC recommendations reinforced and tailored by each state.  That was the game plan.  Nobody gamed out that POTUS would be actively undermining the effort.  You could run a billion simulations and never consider that possibility.  Nobody gamed out that POTUS would actively champion HCQ+AZM as a cure so COVID-19 was no big deal.  All of this nit picking about how scientists failed and not considering the order of magnitude worse problem caused by the White House is frankly incredibly flawed analysis.

When it comes to public health care that requires the support of the people, having a unified public message is the NUMBER ONE priority.  There is no way we could've succeeded during this pandemic with the Trump administration.  It was a non-starter.  Even if the scientists had done everything 100% by the book, there would be chaos and conflicting messages, which has been a hallmark of this Administration.