Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Medicine and Health Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Respiratory Tract Diseases

University of South Florida

Numeracy

Quantitative literacy

Articles 1 - 1 of 1

Full-Text Articles in Medicine and Health Sciences

The Covid-19 Pandemic And The Power Of Numbers, Jessica Ancker May 2020

The Covid-19 Pandemic And The Power Of Numbers, Jessica Ancker

Numeracy

The COVID-19 pandemic has produced a deluge of news coverage of quantitative concepts. In this viewpoint, we provide examples of effective and poor quantitative communication by the professional news media as well as social media communicators. Effective examples include a number of online animations and engaging interactive simulations. Examples of poor quantitative communication include the widespread reporting of raw numbers rather than rates, failing to address uncertainty, not providing sufficient context for numbers, and not discussing the implications of false negative and false positive diagnostic test results. Educators can draw from this body of news to develop compelling quantitative literacy …