Science isn't just about facts and technology. At its core, science is a process. It's a
way of getting from a question to an answer in a logical and repeatable way. You might
remember seeing a method or process for scientific problem solving. It was all the steps that
scientists take along the way. Maybe you've tried it before yourself in school, it probably
looks something like this: start by asking a question, then do research, create a hypothesis
- that's your idea about what the answer is, conduct tests, then you review the data - those
are your findings, you make conclusions based on this data, and then share everything you've
found with other scientists and get them to tell you what they think. This is called peer
review. Finally, you communicate your steps to the public. You tell them what it is that
you found. That is what scientists do. Of course often, their findings just lead to
more questions, so the scientific method isn't exactly a straight line from beginning to
end that we just presented, it's more of a cycle. The answers lead to new questions,
and scientists re-visit the steps as they continue researching, testing, and learning
more, all the while getting closer and closer to the truth. This means that scientific advice
can change. To learn more about why this happens, we reached out to Dr. Raywat Deonandan, he's
an epidemiologist, which means he looks at the patterns of disease to understand why
and how certain groups of people are getting sick. An important thing that we have to consider,
especially in a public health emergency like COVID-19, is that all of this is true until
further notice, because scientists work on the basis of evidence. The more information
we get, the more we refine our analysis and conclusions, so don't be surprised as we change
our minds as new information comes in, we should change our minds! As we go through
this pandemic, our knowledge is evolving. Everything from how the virus spreads to who
who it affects and how! It's all in flux, and that can be confusing. Remember how at
the beginning of all of this we used to wash our groceries? Remember how we weren't allowed
to use playground equipment? Well now we know more and the scientific advice has changed,
and this is normal. This is the way that science works! As scientists learn more about the
virus and the disease, there are updates on what the public needs to do to stay safe.
We asked Dr. Banerjee to tell us more about this. He's a virologist, which means he studies
viruses and the diseases that the cause. One thing that we should understand is we've never
lived in a coronavirus pandemic that's been so widespread, so basically as the pandemic
evolves, the science around it also evolves and we start identifying more factors that
can protect humans. So if you think about why masking was first recommended and then
recommended indoors or recommended outdoors, oftentimes these policies are informed by
scientific investigations and science takes time. So as science evolves, as the investigations
come up with results, these results involve policy changes. So if there's a recommendation
that's coming out on wearing three-layered masks or wearing masks indoors versus outdoors,
that's based on research and that's based on evidence. So as we live through the pandemic,
the science is going to evolve around the recommendations, and the recommendations will
only improve to keep you and me safe and protected from COVID-19. Sometimes, it's hard to know
what to believe or what to do. Here's Dr. Deonandan again to talk about what types of
evidence and sources you can trust. Has a friend sent you a YouTube clip or an article
in the paper or maybe a meme or an experience from an unnamed stranger talking about something,
relaying the science? Maybe they got the COVID vaccine and had a bad reaction or maybe someone's
YouTube clip is talking about some strange theory involving antibodies and how Vitamin
D can cure all your wounds, things like that. Here's the thing: not all evidence is created
equal. Those kinds of reports aren't useless, they're just not as good as other kinds of
reports. So we have something called the pyramid of evidence, in which there's low-quality
evidence at the bottom and high-quality evidence at the top. In general, the best evidence
is on top and the worst evidence is on the bottom. Here we have the worst quality evidence
which is somebody's opinion, even an experts opinion. It's not worthless, it's just not
particularly fantastic for making decisions. At the Very top we have randomized control
trials or clinical trials with a placebo group and a drug group. And even above that we have
this thing called Meta analyses or systematic reviews, because even some randomized trials
aren't fantastic, so we pick only the best ones and distill the information from those
best ones to get us the absolute best evidence. So the bottom line is, recognize that science
has a variety of different kinds of evidence and it matters the quality of evidence that
we use to make decisions. Changing scientific advice is a normal part of the process. Make
sure you use the most current science to make your decisions. But you still have to be on
the lookout for bad information, it could be old or just wrong. That's called 'misinformation'.
Watch out for disinformation too, that's false information that is deliberately spread. Keep
the pyramid of evidence in mind while you evaluate what you hear. As the pandemic evolves,
the science is also evolving but the science is progressing to identify variants. The science
is also catching up on testing the efficacy of these vaccines against emerging variants,
so wear your masks, keep your distance, and let science inform the policy. Together, let's
stop the spread of disinformation. Follow the most current scientific advice and trust
the process of science. To learn more about how to recognize and combat disinformation,
check out the other videos in this series.