新冠疫情应对中的若干统计问题 (Some statistical aspects of the Covid-19 response)

from arxiv, Final post discussion meeting (April 2025) version accepted by Journal of the Royal Statistical Society (Series A), with the response to discussants appended, and links to the discussion contributions on the journal website. Version as final proofs July 2025

This paper discusses some statistical aspects of the U.K. Covid-19 pandemic response, focussing particularly on cases where we believe that a statistically questionable approach or presentation has had a substantial impact on public perception, or government policy, or both. We discuss the presentation of statistics relating to Covid risk, and the risk of the response measures, arguing that biases tended to operate in opposite directions, overplaying Covid risk and underplaying the response risks. We also discuss some issues around presentation of life loss data, excess deaths and the use of case data. The consequences of neglect of most individual variability from epidemic models, alongside the consequences of some other statistically important omissions are also covered. Finally the evidence for full stay at home lockdowns having been necessary to reverse waves of infection is examined, with new analyses provided for a number of European countries.

翻译：本文探讨了英国新冠疫情应对中的若干统计问题，重点关注我们认为统计方法或数据呈现存在疑问、并对公众认知或政府政策（或两者兼有）产生重大影响的案例。我们讨论了与新冠风险相关的统计数据呈现方式，以及应对措施风险的统计评估，指出统计偏差往往呈现相反方向：夸大新冠风险，同时低估应对措施的风险。文中还探讨了生命损失数据、超额死亡数据及病例数据使用中的若干问题，涵盖了流行病模型中忽视个体差异性的后果，以及其他重要统计疏漏的影响。最后，本文通过针对多个欧洲国家的新数据分析，检验了全面居家封锁措施对逆转感染浪潮必要性的证据。