Stanford Study Seeks to Quantify Infections Stemming From Trump Rallies – The New York Times

Based on their models, the researchers concluded that on average, the 18 events produced increases in confirmed cases of more than 250 per 100,000 residents. Extrapolating that figure to the 18 rallies, they concluded that the gatherings ultimately resulted in more than 30,000 confirmed cases of Covid-19 and that the rallies had “likely led to more than 700 deaths,” though those deaths would not necessarily have occurred solely among attendees.

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The paper, posted on academic websites and on Twitter by its authors days before the presidential election, is likely to be contentious. Public health officials in states and counties where Mr. Trump has held rallies said in interviews this week that it was impossible to tie particular infections or outbreaks to the gatherings for several reasons: Caseloads are rising over all, rally attendees often travel from other locations, contact tracing is not always complete, and contact tracers do not always know where infected people have been.

Judd Deere, a White House spokesman, dismissed the study as “a politically driven model based on flawed assumptions and meant to shame Trump supporters.”

“As the president has said, the cure cannot be worse than the disease,” Mr. Deere said in a statement on Saturday. “This country should be open armed with best practices and freedom of choice to limit the spread of Covid-19.”

The study is a “working paper” and has not yet been submitted for peer review, Professor Bernheim said in an interview on Saturday. He said it was common practice for economists to post their work online before submitting it to an academic journal so that other experts could comment on it. He said politics was not the motivation for it.