Benford’s Law and COVID-19 Reporting

Trust in the reported data of contagious diseases in real time is important for policy makers. Media and politicians have cast doubt on Chinese reported data on COVID-19 cases. We find Chinese confirmed infections match the distribution expected in Benford’s Law and are similar to that se...

Täydet tiedot

Bibliografiset tiedot
Päätekijät: Koch, C, Okamura, K
Aineistotyyppi: Journal article
Kieli:English
Julkaistu: Elsevier 2020
Kuvaus
Yhteenveto:Trust in the reported data of contagious diseases in real time is important for policy makers. Media and politicians have cast doubt on Chinese reported data on COVID-19 cases. We find Chinese confirmed infections match the distribution expected in Benford’s Law and are similar to that seen in the U.S. and Italy. We identify a more likely candidate for problems in the policy making process: Poor multilateral data sharing on testing and sampling.