Covid 19 Part XXVIII- 71,942 ROI(2,050 deaths) 51,824 NI (983 deaths) (28/11) Read OP

RTE:

A consultant in infectious diseases at St James's Hospital in Dublin said it would not be safe to reopen restaurants next month, as increasing evidence shows that people gathering indoors and not wearing masks is problematic.

Dr Clíona Ní Cheallaigh said that despite the best efforts of restaurants to operate safely, she said she "cannot see it being safe in December".

Speaking on the same programme, she said that a "recent US study showed that those who contracted the virus were shown to be twice as likely to have eaten in a restaurant over the previous two weeks".



I had a look at the US study she presumably refers to

https://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/volumes/69/wr/mm6936a5.htm?s_cid=mm6936a5_x

The study states: "Adults with positive SARS-CoV-2 test results were approximately twice as likely to have reported dining at a restaurant than were those with negative SARS-CoV-2 test results."

Firstly, she was talking about indoor dining, and referred to the study being about people that had "eaten in a restaurant over the past 2 weeks.

The study, in its findings, clearly specifies eating at a restaurant (i.e. potentially indoor/outdoor) and is clear in its stated limitations:

"The findings in this report are subject to at least five limitations".

"First, the sample included 314 symptomatic patients who actively sought testing during July 1–29, 2020 at 11 health care facilities. Symptomatic adults with negative SARS-CoV-2 test results might have been infected with other respiratory viruses and had similar exposures to persons with cases of such illnesses. Persons who did not respond, or refused to participate, could be systematically different from those who were interviewed for this investigation. Efforts to age- and sex-match participating case-patients and control-participants were not maintained because of participants not meeting the eligibility criteria, refusing to participate, or not responding, and this was accounted for in the analytic approach."

"Second, unmeasured confounding is possible, such that reported behaviors might represent factors, including concurrently participating in activities where possible exposures could have taken place, that were not included in the analysis or measured in the survey. Of note, the question assessing dining at a restaurant did not distinguish between indoor and outdoor options. In addition, the question about going to a bar or coffee shop did not distinguish between the venues or service delivery methods, which might represent different exposures".

"Third, adults in the study were from one of 11 participating health care facilities and might not be representative of the United States population."

"Fourth, participants were aware of their SARS-CoV-2 test results, which could have influenced their responses to questions about community exposures and close contacts."
"Finally, case or control status might be subject to misclassification because of imperfect sensitivity or specificity of PCR-based testing (9,10)."


I'm not saying there is no risk from indoor dining. But the consultant should not state as a fact that it's twice the risk. And as the study limitations allude to, the people going to these things are likely to be going to them more than once, so the overall double risk could be from 5 visits (if I'm interpreting right).

All I'm saying is that when they quote these studies, they shouldn't misrepresent the findings. I'm sure some will disagree with me, but that was my take on the report vs. how she portrayed it.