TY - JOUR
T1 - Statistics did not prove that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market was the early epicentre of the COVID-19 pandemic
AU - Stoyan, Dietrich
AU - Chiu, Sung Nok
N1 - S.N.C. is supported by the Research Matching Grant Scheme (RMGS-2022-11-08) from the Research Grants Council of Hong Kong.
© The Royal Statistical Society 2024
PY - 2024/8
Y1 - 2024/8
N2 - In a recent prominent study, Worobey et al. (2022. The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan was the early epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. Science, 377(6609), 951–959) purported to demonstrate statistically that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market was the epicentre of the early COVID-19 epidemic. We show that this statistical conclusion is invalid on two grounds: (a) The assumption that a centroid of early case locations or another simply constructed point is the origin of an epidemic is unproved. (b) A Monte Carlo test used to conclude that no other location than the seafood market can be the origin is flawed. Hence, the question of the origin of the pandemic has not been answered by their statistical analysis.
AB - In a recent prominent study, Worobey et al. (2022. The Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan was the early epicenter of the COVID-19 pandemic. Science, 377(6609), 951–959) purported to demonstrate statistically that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market was the epicentre of the early COVID-19 epidemic. We show that this statistical conclusion is invalid on two grounds: (a) The assumption that a centroid of early case locations or another simply constructed point is the origin of an epidemic is unproved. (b) A Monte Carlo test used to conclude that no other location than the seafood market can be the origin is flawed. Hence, the question of the origin of the pandemic has not been answered by their statistical analysis.
KW - COVID-19
KW - Monte Carlo test
KW - Statistics did not prove that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market was the early epicentre of the COVID-19 pandemic
KW - critique of statistical methods
KW - centre of point cloud
UR - https://academic.oup.com/jrsssa/advance-article/doi/10.1093/jrsssa/qnad139/7557954?searchresult=1
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85196319622&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1093/jrsssa/qnad139
DO - 10.1093/jrsssa/qnad139
M3 - Journal article
SN - 0964-1998
VL - 187
SP - 710
EP - 719
JO - Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A: Statistics in Society
JF - Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A: Statistics in Society
IS - 3
ER -