Boas informações

A pandemia tem ensinado (ou deveria estar ensinando) o valor da boa informação.John Kay resume isto da seguinte forma:

The value of models in these areas is as a means of organising thought, not of making predictions. And quantitative models are only as good as the information that is fed into them. The greatest scandal of this epidemic is the delay in undertaking widespread testing. Even though the random testing now being undertaken sounds wasteful it would have yielded invaluable data if it had commenced much earlier. The cost of obtaining good economic and epidemiological information is trivial relative to the costs of bad policy made in its absence.

É o velho adágio: "lixo entra, lixo sai". Ou, conforme Dilbert:

Até hoje não sabemos, no Brasil (e talvez na Inglaterra de Kay) qual o resultado de uma testagem aleatória. Desde março o biológo Fernando Reinach chama a atenção para necessidade de testar, testar e testar.