In an emergency, facts matter. It should be simple. But it is not. There are news sources that completely disagree with what the facts are, and your opinion of what’s true can be colored by where you get your news.
Governor Andrew Cuomo has been addressing this in his daily press conferences since they began.
“I will never lie to you,” he promised.
He has been fastidiously careful to differentiate between fact and his opinion in his daily press briefings.
“As FDR said,” he quoted, ‘’’The American people deserve the truth. They can handle the truth.’ Everything I know, I’ve told you.”
But whether you believe him can be influenced by your opinion of him, or of politicians in general. Not everyone trusts government, although this a time when we desperately want to trust our political leaders to do their best for us, stick to the facts, and tell us the truth. All of it.
That tension has been playing out locally on social media. There has been confusion about what the information being shared means, where it comes from, and why there isn’t more of it.
Each day, the state updates its list of confirmed cases of COVID-19, tracking the cases county by county.
The state gets the information first. It then notifies local county public health officials. There is no specific guideline for how those counties get that information out to the public, according to the New York State Association of Counties (NYSAC).
“It’s confusing,” admitted Steven Acquario, executive director of NYSAC. “Patient privacy is paramount, and the state’s Department of Health has issued firm guidelines on protecting that. But beyond that, local health departments have some degree of discretion on how much information should be shared.”
Ulster County has a map of its own, and on it, they list every town and how many cases are confirmed there. It is updated daily. Daniel Torres is deputy county executive there. He said Erie County is also using an identical system with the same software.
“All I can say is that the county executive made this decision based on feedback from the public and in an attempt to be as transparent as possible. We cannot speak for the decisions or rationale for other counties but we believe it was an important thing for us to do.”
Broome County has also begun mapping its cases, as has Orange County. Haley Burton McCrory is chief of staff to Executive Jason Garnar.
“Our number of cases in Broome County have grown over the last days. In that time and upon consultation with our attorneys, we are providing statistical data on the number of cases and sharing that information with the public. By doing this, we are not identifying any individuals/patients in efforts to eliminate the ability of anyone to determine who the positive cases are in compliance with federal and state privacy laws.”
So far, other upstate counties are not following suit. Otsego County releases the number of cases confirmed, but no further details beyond saying that all close contacts of those patients have been notified.
In Delaware County, the Public Health Department at first offered only new case numbers, but has since added more information with each press release, indicating how many cases are hospitalized and how many are able to isolate in their own homes. There was initially a lot of confusion over three announced cases involving patients who used a local address.
Delaware County Public Health Programs Manager Heather Warner explained that those patients were never in the county.
“All reportable communicable disease go through the state and we are notified by them. We include these cases in our press releases in an effort to be transparent - not to add confusion.”
County Supervisor Tina Molé, in response to a request for an explanation for the county’s decision not to publish the town where cases have been confirmed, sent an email response.
“Counties are being discouraged by the NYSDOH not to do this due to our rural nature and population density. Per NYSDOH, both small and large counties that have done this are already experiencing legal repercussions from disclosing this information.”
A spokesman for the Governor’s office, when asked about this statement, sent this reply:
“Both of the points the County Supervisor made are not correct.”
Delaware County then referred questions to its Facebook statement, which added that the decision had been made in consultation with NYSAC as well.
Acquario confirmed that NYSAC has been advising counties on the direction of local health directions, and said rural counties do have unique concerns.
A small town where everyone knows everyone else is quite different from a large urban area. And what impact would knowing which towns were impacted have on the businesses there? It’s too soon to know in the counties where that information is being openly shared.
Molé did not respond to a request for a discussion of what concerns she might have.
Acquario did not confirm that any counties are experiencing “legal repercussions.”
“There is a strong and prevailing argument in rural areas that it’s safer not to disclose,” he said, “fearing it will alter behavior.”
But he acknowledged it’s a fine line, saying that a paramount concern is trust in government
“Without trust, you’re enabling mistrust and chaos.”
