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Those Disappearing Covid Stats: It’s Not Just Florida

August 29, 2021 | FlaglerLive | 12 Comments

florida covid stats blackout
Covid’s statistical view from Florida. (Michael Dziedzic on Unsplash)

Two state government websites in Georgia recently stopped posting updates on covid-19 cases in prisons and long-term care facilities, just as the dangerous delta variant was taking hold.




Data has been disappearing recently in other states as well.

Florida, for example, now reports covid cases, deaths and hospitalizations once a week, instead of daily, as before.

Both states, along with the rest of the South, are battling high infection rates.

Public health experts are voicing concern about the pullback of covid information. Dr. Georges Benjamin, executive director of the American Public Health Association, called the trend “not good for government and the public” because it gives the appearance of governments “hiding stuff.”

A month ago, the Georgia agency that runs state prisons stopped giving public updates on the number of new covid cases among inmates and staff members. The Department of Corrections, in explaining this decision, cited its successful vaccination rates and “a declining number of covid-19 cases among staff and inmates.”

Now, a month later, Georgia has among the highest covid infection rates in the U.S. — along with one of the lowest vaccination rates. But the corrections department hasn’t resumed posting case data on its website.

When asked by KHN about the covid situation in prisons, department spokesperson Joan Heath said Monday that it currently has 308 active cases among inmates.

“We will make a determination whether to begin reposting the daily covid dashboard over the next few weeks, if the current statewide surge is sustained,” Heath said.

Another state website, run by the Department of Public Health, no longer links to a listing of the number of covid cases among residents and staffers of nursing homes and other long-term care residences by facility. The data grid, launched early in the pandemic, gave a running total of long-term care cases and deaths from the virus.

Asked about the lack of online information, public health officials directed a reporter to another agency, the Department of Community Health, which explained that covid information on nursing homes could be found on a federal health website. But locating and navigating that link can be difficult.




“Residents and families cannot easily find this information,” said Melanie McNeil, the state’s long-term care ombudsman. “It used to be easily accessible.”

Georgia gives updates on overall numbers of covid cases, hospitalizations and deaths in the state five days a week but has recently stopped its weekend covid reporting.

Other states also have cut back their public case reporting, despite the nation being engulfed in a fourth, delta-driven covid surge.

Florida had issued daily reports on cases, deaths and hospitalizations until the rate of positive test results dropped in June. Even when caseloads soared in July and August, the state stuck with weekly reporting.

Florida has been accused of being less than transparent with covid health data. Newspapers have sued or threatened to sue the state several times for medical examiner reports, long-term care data, prison data and weekly covid reports the state received from the White House.

Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried, a Democrat running for governor in 2022, has repeatedly questioned Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis’ decision to delay the release of public data on covid cases and has called for restoring daily reporting of covid data.

Nebraska discontinued its daily covid dashboard June 30, then recently resumed reporting, but only weekly. Iowa also reports weekly; Michigan, three days a week.

Public health experts said full information is vital for a public dealing with an emergency such as the pandemic — similar to the government reports needed during a hurricane.

“All the public health things we do are dependent on trust and transparency,” Benjamin said.




A government, when removing public data, should provide a link redirecting people to where they can get that data, he said. And if a state doesn’t have enough staff members to provide regular data, he said, that argues for investment in staff and technology.

People in prisons and long-term care facilities, living in close quarters indoors, are especially vulnerable to infectious diseases such as covid.

“They are usually hotbeds of disease,” said Amber Schmidtke, a microbiologist who tracks covid in Georgia. Family members “want to know what’s going on in there.”

Prison data has been removed or reduced in several states, according to the UCLA School of Law’s COVID Behind Bars Data Project, which tracks the spread of covid in prisons, jails and detention facilities.

The group said Alaska provides only monthly updates on covid cases in such facilities, while Florida stopped reporting new data in June.

When Georgia stopped reporting on covid in prisons, the project found, only 24% of employees reported being vaccinated. Prison workers can spread the virus inside the facilities and then in their homes and the community.

The group reports that at least 93 incarcerated people and four staffers have died of covid in Georgia and that the state has the second-highest case fatality rate, or percentage of those with reported infections who die, among all state and federal prison systems.

“Right now, if there was a massive outbreak in prisons, there would be no way to know it,” said Hope Johnson of the COVID Behind Bars Data Project.

Recent Facebook posts point to cases at Smith State Prison in southeastern Georgia.

Heath, when asked about cases there, said Tuesday that the prison has 19 active covid cases and its transitional center has one.

Mayor Bernie Weaver of Glennville, the Tattnall County town where the prison is located, said he hasn’t been told about recent covid cases at the prison. But he noted that Tattnall itself has had a spike in cases. The county has a 26% vaccination rate, among the lowest in the state.

–Ann Miller, Kaiser Health News. KHN senior correspondent Phil Galewitz contributed to this report.

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Mark says

    August 29, 2021 at 12:23 pm

    Is it the responsibility of the state to publish this info or is it the responsibility of the press to dig and publish this information? Since people usually turn to the press for a truthful take on government info I would say it’s the press’ responsibility.

  2. Pierre Tristam says

    August 29, 2021 at 2:18 pm

    It should be neither the press’ nor the public’s burden to have to “dig” for public health information that should be readily accessible to all, as it previously was, to a degree, in Florida. Currently, large swaths of information, such as the exact proportion of the vaccinated who are in hospital, the number of people suffering from long Covid, the timing of those breakthrough infections, as dated from the time of vaccination (to inform more factual approaches to booster shots)—none of that is available no matter how much you dig. But it’s all essential information, without which beating this is an illusion.

  3. The dude says

    August 29, 2021 at 2:57 pm

    Maybe if some of the orange cultists had access to real and accurate data, they wouldn’t turn to voodoo and pseudo-science like fish tank cleaner or livestock dewormer…

  4. mausborn says

    August 29, 2021 at 5:32 pm

    The calculus that puts political ambitions above people’s lives need to be called out explicitly and every day until it starts to register with people. DeSantis has obviously made the calculation that there are more votes in keeping the Trumpian base happy than those that will be lost to COVID via his political stances.

  5. Frustrated says

    August 29, 2021 at 6:33 pm

    Let’s refocus on the cdc. They stopped reporting breakthrough cases in May. That also is disappearing data. So instead of knowing how many breakthrough cases and hospitalizations and deaths we have for vaccinated versus unvaccinated, we have we get a generic number, such as “ most cases in hospital are from unvaccinated people. But you can’t actually see the data because the cdc isn’t publishing it, so quit the BS, you are focused on discrediting conservative states and not even reporting on what the cdc is doing. Very bad journalism, not objective at all

  6. herewegoagain . says

    August 29, 2021 at 7:43 pm

    HISTORY IS FULL OF LIES:

    Tuskegee Experiments
    Gulf of Tonkin
    MK-Ultra
    Operation Northwoods
    Agent Orange
    Operation Mockingbird
    911 Bombings
    Weapons of Mass Destruction
    Tobacco Companies
    Opiates aren’t Addictive
    Covid Statistics ?

    Perhaps Dr. Georges Benjamin,
    called the trend
    “not good for government and the public”
    because it gives the appearance of governments “hiding stuff.”

    IS RIGHT ON THE MONEY ??

  7. flatsflyer says

    August 30, 2021 at 7:02 am

    It’s all part of the DeathSants strategies to foil the public getting free vaccinations. The shame is that his wife is heavily invested in the alternatives he is pushing. Maybe if his entire family gets the virus he would ask Trump to allow him to change his reporting and be truthful for the first time in his entire life.

  8. joe says

    August 30, 2021 at 7:43 am

    They actually do have access to real and accurate data – they simply choose to ignore it.

  9. Robjr says

    August 30, 2021 at 10:04 am

    They can try and hide the reality, however these numbers don’t lie.

    https://www.orlandosentinel.com/coronavirus/os-ne-coronavirus-morgue-relief-orange-20210827-ljpu6e3lhneshfk42cyivkbnam-story.html

  10. herewegoagain . says

    August 31, 2021 at 12:15 am

    WHY is the State of Florida hiding Covid information ? ..

    WHY is the CDC hiding Covid information ? ..

    WHY is Advent Hospital hiding Covid information ? ..

    WHY was the way information reported changed ? ..

    Questions that come to mind right now ..

  11. herewegoagain . says

    August 31, 2021 at 3:56 pm

    from this mornings MIAMI HEARLD: .. .. SKEWING THE NUMBERS – COOKING THE BOOKS ??

    Miami Herald

    Florida changed its COVID-19 data, creating an ‘artificial decline’ in recent deaths

    Tue, August 31, 2021, 10:12 AM

  12. Sherry says

    August 31, 2021 at 4:24 pm

    Keep in mind that the CDC gets its statistical data from the state governments. If the state delays or distorts the numbers, the CDC data will also be delayed/distorted.

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