- Megan Johanson
Real Data for Real(ly Tough) Decisions
Especially in my job, but really most places in my life, I’m frequently talking about and encouraging people to use data to inform decisions. Now there is a real chance for me to put my money where my mouth is.
I want to share with you my thought process during this emotionally-charged time and what I am doing to make an informed decision when lives may actually depend on it.
The Holiday Struggle
Since March, there has be a lot of data on COVID-19 and great visualizations to make it easier to understand. I have followed data for the state I live in and the states in which my families and friends live. I’ve watched with increasing anxiety as the number of cases have spiked across the country over the past month, all the while having tense and emotional conversations with my husband about our holiday plans.
Never before have we not seen our families over the holidays, and with a 6-month-old baby that almost no one in our families have met yet, the desire to be with family has never been higher. But the need to protect the people I love is stronger.
In these circumstances, I am not willing to let tradition and emotions cloud my judgment, so I am sharing with you the data sources I’m using to monitor the risk involved with visiting family this holiday season. We have not yet made a final decision about traveling, but will within a few weeks.
The Data Sources
The three sources I share below all feature interactive charts that make it easy to explore the data you are interested in. Click on the images or websites below to go to the interactive charts.
Worldometers.info
First, I check out the bar charts of daily new cases and daily deaths where I live and where our families live. What I see is a sharp increase in cases and an increasing number of daily deaths since October.
