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Edmonson County's Number One Source for Local News

Governor's Tweet About Edmonson Positivity Rate In Direct Contrast With State Epidemiologist, Local Numbers

8/19/2020

6 Comments

 
Numbers Still Don't Add Up
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Graphic tweeted from Gov. Andy Beshear's account on August 19, 2020.
Darren Doyle, story:
Governor Andy Beshear's account tweeted a graphic today showing counties in Kentucky with a 5-10% COVID-19 positivity rate (total number of positives divided by the total number of tests administered). Edmonson County was included in this graphic; however, this information is in direct contrast to our conversation last week with the top epidemiologist in KY, Dr. Doug Thoroughman.

Dr. Thoroughman said "Even at the state level, we don't have a good way of accounting in a given county what tests have been given, or how many tests have been given."

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​​He then described a process where all labs are asked to enter information into a daily survey, which is both total number of positives and tests, and break that down into what type of tests they are, but he described that process as "not very good because a lot of those people are repeat-tested so they can be in those numbers more than once." 

"Nothing's perfect, I'll tell you right now, there's no good way to get positivity rate in any state, unless the state health department is the only testing body in the state, there's no good way of getting that."

Unless the state has figured out how to break this down county-by-county in just one week, this graphic cannot be accurate. The only numbers tracked by the regional health department are positive cases, deaths, and recoveries.


According to today's numbers for Edmonson County from the Barren River District Health Department, who doesn't track total amount of tests administered, there are only 14 known active cases in Edmonson County, which has a total population of 12,000. That means as of now, one tenth of one percent of the population of Edmonson County has been confirmed positive for coronavirus (.01%). That obviously isn't the way positivity rates are figured, but without knowing the total number of administered tests to Edmonson County residents, this rate simply cannot be figured. 

Until the state can provide accurate data on tests administered county-by-county, The Edmonson Voice will not report positivity rates, as it would be irresponsible on our part to relay this equation without all the variables necessary to provide accurate numbers.
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6 Comments
Sam Skaggs
8/20/2020 02:08:29 pm

Thank you Darren for the good work. I think all of us agree that we should take this serious. However, I think many of us also feel there is as much politics or more, than science being peddled. Getting really hard to take Andy serious when the state government can't not give sound numbers or methods used to reach this so called dangerous numbers(levels).

Reply
Rhoda Webb Filback
8/20/2020 04:28:20 pm

The following information is meant to be educational and if you are interested, provides some small insight regarding surveillance of infectious disease in the United States. Information regarding health should be sought from qualified medical professionals rather than politicians.
Public health is a complicated specialty that "treats" the community, not individuals. The graphic mentioned was provided by The White House Coronavirus Taskforce. This committee and the CDC likey use information mined from the National Syndromic Surveillance Program instead of hard test results to calculate county positivity rates. States are not privy to the information in this system. It is provided to each state weekly by The White House Coronavirus Taskforce.
Test results, particularly when they take days to back, put you way behind if you are attempting to prevent spread. Information regarding the National Syndromic Surveillance Program can be found on the CDC website.

Reply
Chris Thompson
8/20/2020 05:25:16 pm

I read the article on COVID Positivity rate and I read this one. It sounds like to me the Voice did some old fashioned journalism work on this one and that's something you don't see anymore. So you tried to get this info at home then went all the way up the ladder till you talked to the head dude. The head dude says they don't have county positivity rates then the White House does. You don't have to be a political scientist to understand ol Uncle Andy doesn't agree with the White HOuse, yet here he is sharing this information--you know why? cause it fits his narrative. "let's scare the crap out of KY and then I'll come in and lead us through something that really isn't that bad." Everybody sees thru this crap dude. Andy, hush.

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Tammy Thein
8/21/2020 10:10:13 am

You sure like to criticize everything our Governor does.

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Michael Evans
8/21/2020 10:29:01 pm

It’s called journalism, Karen. It’s not the Voice’s job to blindly follow the governor or anyone else. Beshear is fear mongering with this garbage. Darren just called him out on it. Keep up the good work Edmonson Voice.

Reply
Jamie Madison
8/21/2020 10:39:53 pm

When has this site ever criticized the governor? I’ll wait....

One of the reason I like Edmonson County Voice is that I don’t know their politics.

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