As an interdisciplinary researcher studying both epidemiology and economics, I worry that differences in evidentiary standards of these fields predispose us to harming people indirectly through the economy in the service of preventing harm in a pandemic. When SARS-CoV-2 infects a patient’s lungs and the patient tragically dies due to respiratory failure, it’s clear that the patient died because of SARS-CoV-2. If we follow the chain of causation backward before a patient’s death, there are...
