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Rachel Thomas Profile picture
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7 Dec, 8 tweets, 3 min read
There is widespread, well-documented ableism, racism, & unnecessary gatekeeping in STEM & medicine, and this is damaging our pandemic response in the West.

Pointing this out does not make you anti-science (I love science, but this is a huge problem). 1/
Disabled & chronically people have crucial expertise, and this expertise is being ignored 2/

Prominent health institutions were warned about the severe risk of post-viral illness BEFORE the pandemic 3/

Expertise in East Asia has been ignored. Official public health advice in Japan in March 2020 was better than official advice being given NOW in the USA, UK, & Australia 4/

Many African countries have great public health infrastructure. In March 2020, Senegal was returning covid test results in 4 hrs, while USA took 1 week. Ghana was early to use pool testing & extensive contact tracing. South Africa found omicron 1st due to superior sequencing. 5/
Racism is one reason western countries are unwilling to learn from other countries, particularly those in Asia & Africa 6/

Gatekeeping has kept aerosol engineers & airflow scientists from leading roles in pandemic response. Research that doesn't involve randomized control trials is seen as inferior (even when RCTs don’t make sense or would be unethical) #COVIDisAirborne 7/

Our medical & public health institutions in the West would be stronger if they recognized and included the expertise of:
- Disabled & chronically ill people
- People from other domains (eg aerosol engineers & atmospheric chemists)
- Scientists in Africa & Asia 8/

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More from @math_rachel

Rachel Thomas Profile picture
5 Dec
We can not fix public health until we reckon w/ how institutions have failed public’s trust (harmful advice, contradictory rules, overconfidence, disbelief of suffering patients). Patronizing "shut up & trust the experts" is not going to address this 1/
Some folks tell me experts gave the best advice known at the time, that nobody knew, that the evidence changed.

I need to share a few receipts. In March 2020, I publicly advocated for ordinary people to wear masks, at a time when CDC & WHO said not to 2/ Screenshot of tweet from @math_rachel Mar 29, 2020: Please rtweet from @math_rachel, Mar 29, 2020: Medical-grade masks stweet from @math_rachel, April 14, 2020. Excited about this screenshot of a youtube video. Image of Rachel and Jeremy.
In March 2020, I said young & healthy people should NOT assume they were safe from potential long-term impacts of covid. I shared historical review of flu pandemics leading to neurological problems. 3/ tweet from @math_rachel, March 12, 2020: This is something mtweet from @math_rachel: Mar 13, 2020: "For more than atweet from @math_rachel, Mar 13, 2020: Don't just assume tha
Read 7 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
3 Dec
A problem w telling people "just trust the medical experts" is that they still need enough time & scientific literacy to discern whether to trust "experts" promoting mass infection of kids, droplet transmission, & claims LongCovid is psychogenic, OR experts who say opposite 1/
(to be clear, do NOT trust the 1st group)

There seem to be ZERO professional consequences for repeatedly being wrong for last 22 months. Some folks in 1st group have prestigious credentials & platforms in major media outlets. General public may not know their track records 2/
So general public needs to invest a fair amount of time (which many do not have) just to know who to trust, what is true, & how to stay safe. At the same time, will be condescended to & criticized for disagreeing w/ "experts" 3/
Read 4 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
1 Dec
There has been more focus on whether the public trusts institutions (governments, medicine, public health orgs) than on how those institutions could better earn our trust. 1/

Western leaders have expressed confidence even when they were completely wrong, and have been unwilling to express uncertainty, even when it would have been more honest 2/

We've seen politicians upgrade parliament to have excellent air ventilation, as school children & essential workers are forced into poorly ventilated buildings with insufficient mitigations #COVIDisAirborne 3/

Read 14 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
30 Nov
On *reviewability* of automated decision making (ADM), rather than *explainability*

Reviewability does not necessarily involve explanations. It is about exposing the decision-making process, including human processes, structures, & systems around a model

papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… Reviewability of ADM does not therefore necessarily involve
Explanations focused on how a model has arrived at an output may miss much of what is important. A more holistic view could include information on testing & auditing procedures, training data, effects of decisions on protected characteristics, & more. 2/ @jennifercobbe As such, explanations focused on how the model itself has ar
Judicial review of public sector decision-making does not simply assess the decision itself, but the decision-making process as a whole

An understanding of human decision-making as a process that begins before the decision and that has consequences that resonate afterwards 3/ act in line with long-established principles of good adminis
Read 4 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
29 Nov
My newest post: Doing Data Science for Social Good, Responsibly 1/

fast.ai/2021/11/23/dat…
Data use by non-profits can be powerful, such as this CA vaccine equity analysis by @ACLU_NorCal @snowjake & @DataInstituteSF @MaxShinnerl (I mentored) 2/

Recent projects in which @QUTDataScience partnered with @CCQld & @fareshare_aus were a success 3/
Read 10 tweets
Rachel Thomas Profile picture
28 Nov
Flaws of countering disinfo w/ appeal to authority:

"Worrying about whether we trust institutions without asking if these institutions deserve trust... A program of infantalization – trust that the adults know what is right – will provoke equally infantile resistance." @Aelkus We have gotten very far from the original goal of trying to
Failure of legacy institutions to respond appropriately to the pandemic, from March 2020 @aelkus, h/t @RSButner

aelkus.github.io/problem/2020/0…
A society that cares more about declining trust in institutions than what institutions have done to deserve trust – and which devotes far more effort towards managing the behavioral psychology of risk than actually reducing risk – is engaged in narrative-making above all else. Managing public health and disease was one of the core tasks
Read 4 tweets

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