covid_ed

This talk describes my six-month effort to develop a COVID-19 tracking website for Missouri, which began as an effort to provide daily data snapshots over Twitter and soon grew into a regularly update website providing data across a range of jurisdictions. I reflect on the process of developing these data products, the need for public, descriptive science during a pandemic, and lessons learned from this experience. Among these lessons are reflections on health and social disparities caused by the pandemic, the need for new data efforts to be able to track these in real-time, and a need to re-conceptualize what the “social safety-net” encompasses.

Transcript

1. Unequal Access Social Disparities and Public Science in the Age of COVID-19 Christopher Prener, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Sociology 10.06.2020
2. Unequal Access Social Disparities and Public Science in the Age of COVID-19 Christopher Prener, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of Sociology 10.06.2020
4. Acknowledgments Saint Louis University School of Education Especially Dean Gary Ritter, Ph.D. and Cameron Anglum, Ph.D. Department of Computer Science Especially Chair Michael Goldwasser, Ph.D. and David Ferry, Ph.D. Student Contributors Alvin Do Metta Pham Eric Quach
5. Acknowledgments Saint Louis University School of Education Especially Dean Gary Ritter, Ph.D. and Cameron Anglum, Ph.D. Department of Computer Science Especially Chair Michael Goldwasser, Ph.D. and David Ferry, Ph.D. Student Contributors Alvin Do Metta Pham Eric Quach
7. Zoom I recommend using Zoom’s Side-by-side Mode to view today’s talk!
8. AGENDA 1. Preface 2. What do I mean by public science? 3. How, and why, have I been tracking COVID-19? 4. What are the health and social consequences of COVID-19? 5. Why should we re-think the social safety-net? SAINT LOUIS UNIVERSITY | ST. LOUIS, MO | 10.06.2020
9. ▸ Medical and urban sociologist with an interest in spatial and computational methods ▸ Affiliations: • SLU’s Advanced HEAlth Data Research Institute • SLU’s Institute for Healing Justice and Equity • Northeastern University’s Institute for Health Equity and Social Justice Research 1. PREFACE “HI, I’M CHRIS”
10. 1. PREFACE INTELLECTUAL TRAJECTORY
11. What do I mean by public science? ?
12. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY MICHAEL BURAWOY Indiana University
13. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY MICHAEL BURAWOY Indiana University
14. IT ENTAILS, THEREFORE, A DOUBLE CONVERSATION… [BETWEEN] WHAT I CALL TRADITIONAL PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY… [AND] ORGANIC PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY Michael Burawoy “Public Sociology” (2005)
15. Wikimedia Commons W.E.B. DU BOIS JANE ADDAMS
16. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY MICHAEL BURAWOY Indiana University
17. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SOCIOLOGY MICHAEL BURAWOY “presenting findings in an accessible manner” Indiana University
18. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SCIENCE “presenting findings in an accessible manner”
19. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SCIENCE “presenting findings in an accessible manner”
20. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SCIENCE “presenting findings in an accessible manner”
21. 2. PUBLIC SCIENCE PUBLIC SCIENCE “presenting findings in an accessible manner” engaging in descriptive research that moves public discourse forward
22. IT IS AS IF GRADUATE SCHOOL IS ORGANIZED TO WINNOW AWAY AT THE MORAL COMMITMENTS THAT INSPIRED THE INTEREST IN SOCIOLOGY IN THE FIRST PLACE. Michael Burawoy “Public Sociology” (2005)
23. Wikimedia Commons W.E.B. DU BOIS JANE ADDAMS
24. Why, and how, have I been tracking COVID-19? ?
25. 3. TRACKING COVID-19 OBSERVATIONS FROM MARCH ▸ The State of Missouri’s Department of Health and Senior Services (DHSS) was reporting limited data. ▸ Early media reporting of statistics often focused on counts instead of rates. ▸ There was a lack of a regional perspective, with lots of county or state specific numbers being reported. ▸ There was little attention being paid to change over time, particularly at the county-level in Missouri. ▸ There was no attention being paid to racial or socioeconomic disparities.
26. THE TWEET THAT LAUNCHED… MANY MORE TWEETS
29. DATA PIPELINE Johns Hopkins University COVID-19 Database (via GitHub) Census Bureau (via API) Missouri COVID Tracking Database Missouri COVID Visualizations
30. DATA PIPELINE New York Times COVID-19 Database (via GitHub) Census Bureau (via API) Missouri COVID Tracking Database Missouri COVID Visualizations and Website
31. DATA PIPELINE New York Times COVID-19 Database (via GitHub) St. Louis, Jefferson, and St. Charles counties and the City of St. Louis (via scrapers+manual entry) Missouri COVID Tracking Database Missouri COVID Visualizations and Website State of Missouri (via scrapers+manual entry) Atlantic COVID-19 Project (via API) Census Bureau (via API)
32. DATA PIPELINE New York Times COVID-19 Database (via GitHub) St. Louis, Jefferson, and St. Charles counties and the City of St. Louis (via scrapers+manual entry) Missouri COVID Tracking Database Missouri COVID Visualizations and Website State of Missouri (via scrapers+manual entry) Atlantic COVID-19 Project (via API) Census Bureau (via API)
33. DATA SETS Missouri COVID Tracking Database
34. DATA SETS Missouri COVID Tracking Database State Morbidity, Mortality, and Case Fatality (M/M/CF) Regional Morbidity Metropolitan Statistical Area M/M/CF County M/M/CF ZIP Code / ZCTA Morbidity County-level Spatial M/M/CF Data State and St. Louis City+County M/M by Race
42. http://slu-opengis.github.io/covid_daily_viz/
43. http://slu-opengis.github.io/covid_daily_viz/
44. http://slu-opengis.github.io/covid_daily_viz/
45. http://slu-opengis.github.io/covid_daily_viz/
52. 3. TRACKING COVID-19 REFLECTIONS ▸ Research, data, and communication are not the first priority: ▸ COVID-19 data sources suffer from a lack of standardization, often cannot be accessed. ▸ COVID-19 “dashboards” are all the rage, but there are frequent issues across jurisdictions with how similar metrics are being communicated. ▸ This has increased demand for my COVID tracking project. ▸ Iterating on analyses is not something we always get to do, but it is tremendously gratifying. ▸ Open data and science are also about community and communication.
53. What are health and social consequences of COVID-19? ?
58. FOR THE PROBLEM OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY IS THE PROBLEM OF COLOR LINE W.E.B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk (1903) Wikimedia Commons
59. EXCLUSIONARY ZONING IN ST. LOUIS Erenow
60. 3. HEALTH AND SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF COVID-19 RESTRICTIVE DEED COVENANTS ETHEL SHELLEY St. Louis Post-Dispatch
61. “SLUM” CLEARANCE Wikimedia Commons
62. REDLINING Missouri Bar Association
67. City of St. Louis
68. City of St. Louis
69. 3. HEALTH AND SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF COVID-19 UNEMPLOYMENT & COVID-19 The estimated unemployment rate during the Great Depression in the 1930s was around 25%. COVID is the worst experience with unemployment we have had since then.
73. 3. HEALTH AND SOCIAL CONSEQUENCES OF COVID-19 FOOD INSECURITY & COVID-19 Access to food has been disrupted by these changes in employment, particularly for households that have young children.
74. FOR THE PROBLEM OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY IS THE PROBLEM OF COLOR LINE W.E.B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk (1903) Wikimedia Commons
75. Why should we rethink the social safety-net? ?
76. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET FOOD INSECURITY & COVID-19 Access to food has been disrupted by these changes in employment, particularly for households that have young children.
77. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET WHAT IS THE SAFETY-NET? In the United States, it is primarily means-tested programs defined in relation to the Federal poverty line.
78. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET WHAT IS THE SAFETY-NET? “In 2000, the Institute of Medicine defined safety-net hospitals (SNHs) as hospitals that, by mission or mandate, provide care to a substantial share of vulnerable patients regardless of their ability to pay.” - Popescu et al. 2019 KOLR
79. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET EMS & THE SAFETY-NET Unsplash / Obi Onyeador
80. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET EDUCATION & THE SAFETY-NET Unsplash / Taylor Wilcox
81. EDUCATION & COVID-19 State of Texas
82. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET EDUCATION & COVID-19 NBC New York
83. 4. RETHINKING THE SOCIAL SAFETY-NET EDUCATION & THE SAFETY-NET Unsplash / NeONBRAND
84. Slides available via SpeakerDeck Follow on the web: speakerdeck.com/chrisprener/ covid_ed Raw data, code available via GitHub github.com/slu-openGIS/ MO_HEALTH_Covid_Tracking chris.prener@slu.edu chris-prener.github.io LEARN MORE THANKS FOR COMING! ! " # @chrisprener Visualization code available via GitHub github.com/slu-openGIS/ covid_daily_viz slu-opengis.github.io/covid_daily_viz/