ArticleRevista da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical2020
Evidence, rationality, and ignorance: Agnotological issues in COVID-19 science.
Article in Revista da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed.
- COVID-19 Medical and Pharmacological Management in the European Countries Compared to Italy: An Overview.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Review
- What happens in Brazil? A pandemic of misinformation that culminates in an endless disease burden.Revista da Sociedade Brasileira de Medicina Tropical · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
1 author.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Two decades ago, Robert Proctor coined the term agnotology to refer to the study of ignorance that stems from scientific research. Amid the coronavirus disease pandemic, the world is witnessing the greatest natural experiment ever, and countries have adopted different response strategies. An evaluation of the effectiveness of different policies will play a valuable role in preparing for future public health emergencies. However, controversial issues such as the timing and pathways of viral emergence, the effectiveness of social distancing and lockdown strategies, and the use of antimalarial drugs as therapy have still not been fully resolved. This serves as a fertile breeding ground for agnotological strategies, whereby scientific studies are deliberately or unintentionally designed to create distractions or draw conclusions that are not supported by research findings. Researchers, public health authorities, and healthcare workers should be equipped to identify such agnotological strategies, distinguish them from scientific fraud, and avoid drawing misleading inferences based on an irrational adherence to hypotheses and a lack of criticism of implausible results.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.