Anti-lockdown ideologues are now falling prey to the ecological fallacy in their bad epidemiological studies in the same way antivaxxers have been doing for years. Cranks gonna crank, I guess.

Anti-lockdown ideologues are now falling prey to the ecological fallacy in their bad epidemiological studies in the same way antivaxxers have been doing for years. Cranks gonna crank, I guess.
Danish researchers published a negative randomized controlled study of masks to prevent COVID-19. Is this slam dunk evidence that masks don’t work? Not so fast, there pardner…
This month the largest epidemiological study of its kind was published and concluded, once again, that autism is primarily due to genes and that the environmental component of autism risk is small. Not surprisingly, once again antivaxers didn’t want to hear that message.
Yet another huge epidemiological study finds no association between vaccination with MMR and autism. Same as it ever was. That doesn’t stop a particularly clueless antivaxer from trying to “refute” it, to hilariously inept results.
The claim that medical errors are the third leading cause of death in the US has always rested on very shaky evidence; yet it’s become common wisdom that is cited as though everyone accepts it. But if estimates of 250,000 to 400,000 deaths due to medical error are way too high, what is the real number? A study published last month suggests that it’s almost certainly a lot lower and has been modestly decreasing since 1990.