Inadequate Information.

Here in the UK the BBC News website gives daily figures for known deaths and infections related to Corvid-19. The problem is that it only gives actual numbers; it doesn’t publicise the rate of deaths and infections, which would be more useful because it would give a better picture of relative risk.

An example of this has been the large number of deaths in the USA. It’s been headlined on the news page because of the high number, but has made no mention of relative population sizes. America currently has approximately twice as many deaths as the UK, but is also around 5x the size in terms of population. It doesn’t require a calculator to work out, therefore, that the mortality rate in Britain – and France, Italy and Spain – is substantially higher than it is in America. (And I do realise that New York is an exception. Plague pits aren't nice.)

And so I ask myself whether this is an example of the BBC being stupid, the BBC assuming that Britons are too stupid to understand the difference, a deliberate ploy to massage perceptions, or something else entirely.