Taking uncertainty
seriously
No doubt, scientists are working relentlessly to find answers to the
many questions and solutions to the pandemic. But the desperate
situation appears to excite desperate measures.13 We
are lead into what has been called a “once-in-a century evidence
fiasco.”14
In order to target our efforts to reduce uncertainty, we need to pay
attention to the various kinds of uncertainty. Reducing
risk15 and fundamental uncertainty is in vain if
ambiguity prevails. For example, increasing test accuracy (technically)
has shown to be of little help when the sampling method or validation
procedure is inappropriate. Correspondingly, great treatment efforts can
be futile if we ignore important factors for preventing, diagnosing, or
treating COVID-19.
Hence, the tasks for scientists strongly depend on the kinds of
uncertainty. Correspondingly, our tasks are fourfold and mapped in Table
2.
Table 1 Tasks for scientists corresponding to the four types of
uncertainty.