Really good analysis of Reynolds 12-point program at Iowa Fiscal Partnership [View all]

By Peter Fisher
http://www.iowafiscal.org/covid-metrics-arbitrary-backward-facing/

excerpt:

One of those projections, by the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) of the University of Washington and updated April 5, shows the wide range of possibilities. They predict a peak day of April 26, with Iowa needing between 53 and 438 ICU beds, and 150 as the best estimate, compared to 246 available beds. They predict a need for between 42 and 367 ventilators, and a peak of 17 deaths per day (with a range of 0 to 100), with 263 to 711 total deaths in the state by August.[2] These predictions assume that Iowa takes more serious measures in seven days — a stay-at-home order and mandatory closure of all nonessential businesses. If the governor still sees no need for further restrictions by then, the situation could be worse.

So what is the Governor relying on that leads her to believe that halfway measures are adequate to protect our health care workers and our citizens, and to prevent such shortages? The “metrics” and “data,” referred to repeatedly but vaguely in press briefings, became clear to the public only on Wednesday, when the “Guidelines for Implementing Public Health Mitigation Measures” were obtained by the Iowa City Press-Citizen. While we now know something of how the guidelines work, much remains a mystery. We do not know why this scoring system was adopted, who developed it, what science is behind the measures and the scores, whether any other state or country has used anything like it, or whether it was vetted by any qualified epidemiologists at Iowa universities or hospitals. The matrix cannot be found anywhere on the IDPH website, and the underlying data have not been released despite repeated requests by members of the media and others.

What we do know is that the application of the model does not give much hope to the many groups pressing the governor for more aggressive measures, most recently the Iowa Board of Medicine.[3] Suppose you live in the southeast portion of Iowa, where the overall incidence of COVID-19 is the highest in the state. Even there you are not going to get a shelter-in-place order from the governor anytime soon, as long as she is wedded to the IDPH matrix.