Should the CDC make COVID-19 data publicly available as soon as it comes in?
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Click here to read the Cover Story, "‘Trusted messengers’ can improve COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy."
Last month, The New York Times reported that the CDC has withheld some of the data it has collected on COVID-19 boosters and hospitalizations.
We asked Amesh A. Adalja, MD, senior scholar at Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, and Peter Chin-Hong, MD, Infectious Disease News Editorial Board Member and professor of medicine and director of the transplant infectious disease program at the University of California, San Francisco, if the CDC should always make the data it collects publicly available as soon as it is collected. They agreed: yes, it should.
[Editor’s note: In a previous version of this post, we incorrectly characterized Adalja’s answer as supporting the withholding of COVID-19 data. We regret the error.]
Adalja: Throughout the pandemic, the CDC has been plagued by miscommunication and being considered as a political arm of whatever administration was in power. The new reports on delaying or not publishing all data on the pandemic in an expeditious manner come at a time when there is low confidence in the CDC.
The CDC is the premiere health agency for the country, and it is critical that the population trust it. They have the ability to provide nuanced communication that isn’t misinterpreted, so I don’t believe that is an excuse for declining to publish information that people desperately need to see, even if the data have limitations.
Nuanced and precision-guided recommendations should be the norm in public health, and they should be backed by data that are very visible rather than one-size-fits-all recommendations that many people do not always heed.
Chin-Hong: I 100% think the CDC should definitely make COVID-19 data available as they come in or soon after. With a fast-moving pandemic, a delay in communicating data with real implications to local jurisdictions can affect how individuals make decisions.
We need U.S.-centric data that can help us put data from other countries in perspective. Could there be a happy medium where information is more nimbly assessed for quality than a beta version released with a disclaimer?
A faster release of data may also lead to more equity because some states have many more resources than others. A more centralized stewardship and release of data can assist all regions in the country equally.
At the end of the day, a timely release of data builds trust with the public, already beleaguered with a pandemic that is as much about politics as it is about human health.
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