2022 is not the year to sniff Yankee Candles

Data driven doctors trawl sewage and sniff candles to predict the future

Recently, I saw a physician whose goes by Data Driven MD argue that no smell Yankee Candle reviews are up, which means…. COVID19 is coming! Oh no!

To bad Dr. Data Driven didn’t do his homework. He hasn’t kept up to date on the latest COVID fear-mongering studies. Neither have the 141,000 people who liked the tweet.

Of course, COVID19 cases will again rise, that’s inevitable, but candle sniffling doesn’t predict the future. Candle or no candle, COVID19 will, in short course, infect 93-97% of people around the world, and then it will infect them many times over in their long lives. This will happen no matter what we do in response. Have the strength to change the things you can, accept the things you can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference.

What data driven does not know is that the data for COVID19 cases and no smell candle reviews are dubious (of low credibility). When researchers have claimed a link, it was backwards! Cases rise before candle reviews. Here is one study that examined the hypothesis.

It found that last weeks covid cases weakly predicted no smell reviews but not the other way around (Beta 2 is null, Beta 4 is weakly positive). But this model is weakly constructed, this idea (was once) incredibly sexy (aka lots of analytic plans), so I place very, very low credibility around the estimate.

Meanwhile directly examining COVID cases from last week shows… drum roll… no big rise.

I do not understand how we have so large a fraction of forever anxious people unwilling to accept reality. Nearly all of us will get COVID19. No one can wear an n95 forever. Thankfully, with vaccines, natural immunity and a less lethal variant, it will be fine. The IFR for covid is now on par with or far less than flu (depending on your age). Most Americans get this and have returned to normal life, while a few obsessively check candle reviews. Who knows? They may write some themselves!

There is no need to huff Yankee Candles to know that you are feeling fine, and reading reviews will only tell you: you might love bergamot. Cases precede reviews in one weak study, and not the other way around. Frankly, any data driven expert would doubt even that link.

Now, If you want to really be a hero, time to start sampling the sewage….

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Kidding!