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| Gallup Survey: Republicans Underestimate COVID Risks While Democrats Overestimate Them |
| 2021-03-19 |
| h/t HotAir A six-month survey of 35,000 Americans carried out by Gallup and Franklin Templeton concluded that there was COVID misinformation circulating on both sides of the political aisle. Here’s how the NY Times described the findings: To many liberals, Covid has become another example of the modern Republican Party’s hostility to facts and evidence. And that charge certainly has some truth to it. Yet the particular story with Covid is also more complicated — because conservatives aren’t the only ones misinterpreting scientific evidence in systematic ways. Americans on the left half of the political spectrum are doing it, too. The errors on both sides tend to reinforce the perception that the virus is either not much of a threat or far more dangerous than it actually is. For instance, here’s a chart from a Brookings write-up of the results showing how people in each party believe COVID deaths are distributed by age. As you can see, the truth (yellow bar) is that 80% of deaths have been among those 65 and up. Both parties tend to underestimate old age as a factor in COVID deaths but Democrats’ estimates are consistently worse (further from reality). The Jukes and the Kallikaks? |
| Posted by:g(r)omgoru |
| #3 There should be a survey on how "Misleading Surveys Are" |
| Posted by: magpie 2021-03-19 19:31 |
| #2 The actual # of COVID-19 deaths in those 18 years and younger is never publicized. |
| Posted by: Thineger Sproing6704 2021-03-19 13:51 |
| #1 Wonder how the poll accounted for the 50% increase in likely Covid infections which would correlate to a reduction of death and hospitalization risks recently reported as likely. If so it seems Republican might have overestimated the risk as well, just by a sliver. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2021-03-19 10:36 |