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Public Health

Bloviating and Bungling the COVID-19 Pandemic

Educational Objective
To identify the key insights or developments described in this article

1 Credit CME

JAMA Network Open

Published Online: December 10, 2020

Invited Commentary

Article Information and Disclosures

Donald A. Redelmeier, MD, MS(HSR)^1,2,3,4;

Fizza Manzoor, MD^1,2

Author Affiliations

¹Department of Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
²Evaluative Clinical Sciences, Sunnybrook Research Institute, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
³Institute for Clinical Evaluative Sciences, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario, Canada
⁴Centre for Quality Improvement and Patient Safety, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Center, Toronto, Ontario, Canada

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Wegwarth and coauthors¹ shed some light into why their country of Germany has fared better than the United States in handling the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.¹ As of November 1, 2020, for example, the mortality rate per million was 5 times lower in Germany than in the United States (128 vs 715, respectively).² Indeed, the mortality rate in Germany was lower than almost every American state, including Hawaii. This difference in mortality, morbidity, and lost quality of life is difficult to attribute to medical technology, drug therapy, underlying genetics, environmental factors, or virus characteristics. One contributing factor may be differences in public health messages intended to guide individual behaviors to mitigate the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Article Information

Published: December 10, 2020. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.32540

Open Access: This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the CC-BY License. © 2020 Redelmeier DA et al. JAMA Network Open.

Corresponding Author: Donald A. Redelmeier, MD, MS(HSR), Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, G-151, 2075 Bayview Ave, Toronto, ON M4N 3M5, Canada (dar@ices.on.ca).

Conflict of Interest Disclosures: None reported.

Funding/Support: This project was supported by author funding from the Canada Research Chair in Medical Decision Sciences and the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.

Role of the Funder/Sponsor: The funding organizations had no role in the design and conduct of the study; collection, management, analysis, and interpretation of the data; preparation, review, or approval of the manuscript; and decision to submit the manuscript for publication.

Additional Contributions: We thank Cindy Kao, BSc (University of Toronto), Kelvin Ng, BSc (University of Toronto), and Robert Redelmeier, BSc (University of Toronto), for helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article. They were not compensated for their contributions, which were part of usual student activities.

References

Wegwarth O , Wagner GG , Spies C , Hertwig R . Assessment of German public attitudes toward health communications with varying degrees of scientific uncertainty regarding COVID-19. JAMA Netw Open. 2020;3(12):e2032335. doi:10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2020.32335 Google Scholar

Worldometers. COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic. November 1, 2020. Accessed November 3, 2020. https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/#countries

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Howe LC , MacInnis B , Krosnick JA , Markowitz EM , Socolow R . Acknowledging uncertainty impacts public acceptance of climate scientists’ predictions. Nat Clim Chang. 2019;9:863-867. doi:10.1038/s41558-019-0587-5 Google Scholar Crossref

Slovic P . Perception of risk. Science. 1987;236(4799):280-285. doi:10.1126/science.3563507 PubMed Google Scholar Crossref

Fetherstonhaugh D , Slovic P , Johnson S , Friedrich J . Insensitivity to the value of human life: a study of psychophysical numbing. J Risk Uncertain. 1997;14(3):283-300. doi:10.1023/A:1007744326393 Google Scholar Crossref

AMA CME Accreditation Information

Credit Designation Statement: The American Medical Association designates this Journal-based CME activity activity for a maximum of 1.00  AMA PRA Category 1 Credit(s)™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.

Successful completion of this CME activity, which includes participation in the evaluation component, enables the participant to earn up to:

1.00 Medical Knowledge MOC points in the American Board of Internal Medicine's (ABIM) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program;;
1.00 Self-Assessment points in the American Board of Otolaryngology – Head and Neck Surgery’s (ABOHNS) Continuing Certification program;
1.00 MOC points in the American Board of Pediatrics’ (ABP) Maintenance of Certification (MOC) program;
1.00 Lifelong Learning points in the American Board of Pathology’s (ABPath) Continuing Certification program; and
1.00 CME points in the American Board of Surgery’s (ABS) Continuing Certification program

It is the CME activity provider's responsibility to submit participant completion information to ACCME for the purpose of granting MOC credit.