Talk:COVID-19 pandemic in Rhode Island

Map

Where's the map showing where COVID-19 is? 14:14, 19 April 2020 (UTC)Tym2412 (talk)

Add Individual Sections Detailing the Pandemic

Hi,

As someone that has been editing/updating/creating statistics and adding current events, I feel that the article should include more insight than just a timeline. For example, including individual sections for education, government response throughout, etc. This would most likely not impact the "Timeline" section, as some events can be used as a backdrop to create certain sections.

Discuss whether adding these types of sections would benefit or hurt the article. I will start by saying that I approve.

Bowser498 (talk) 19:36, 29 December 2021 (UTC)

Statistics Section

Discuss whether an individual section for statistics is needed. Currently, the two main graphics seem to be plopped in the middle of the article. As someone that has a spreadsheet with RI statistics (some taken from RIDOH, but most are calculated myself using their statistics as a backdrop), I would love to see a separate section for statistics. This would not affect any statistics mentioned in the introduction (# of cases, deaths, vaccinations, breakthrough infections) or the infographic towards the top of the page. However, the table of municipalities and the case/death counts per day would be moved to this section, plus other types of graphs. If any given statistics on the page need to be transferred into a table (ex: case and death counts throughout the pandemic, or even adding more statistics onto the municipality table), the original statistics can be kept, but the corresponding table/graphic would go in its own section.

For example, I recently created my own graph detailing the case fatality rate (CFR) in RI throughout the pandemic (If you are interested in looking at it, go to my personal spreadsheet in my profile and then go to "CFR in RI"; since I made the graph in Sheets, I'll have to find a way to transfer it into a Wikipedia graphic).

Thus, I will approve of adding a statistics section within the article (if people approve of this, discuss where in the article it should be placed. I personally think it should be near the end).

Bowser498 (talk) 04:21, 30 December 2021 (UTC)

Endemic stage

I think this article uses timelines far too much, and the format of the article should move away from this. Further, the endemic stage of COVID management is remarkable enough to warrant its own section, @Doc Strange: consider reinstating the section. SmolBrane (talk) 18:36, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

Pinging @Bowser498: given their relevant comments above. This article doesn't align with Wikipedia:Manual_of_Style/Layout. SmolBrane (talk) 18:45, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

I more or less agree that this page probably should be moved away from being one big timeline for layout and readability sake. I think whichever editors chose the page to be in a timeline format in 2020 didn't expect it to get this big. I mostly moved that into the timeline for consistency's sake - I only really continue with the timeline because it's the format of the page at the moment, not because I personally endorse it as the format. It would take quite a bit of work to turn it into something other than a timeline, though, considering it's almost entirely one at this point. I think Bowser and I are the only editors who really update this page on the regular and I only do so in order to keep the information up to date. We might need some additional help in turning this to prose and sections while keeping most of the content intact. Doc Strange^MailboxLogbook 20:53, 2 June 2022 (UTC)

Fair enough--I don't want to dissuade any contributions and I doubt I'll sink the time into rebuilding this article. But continuing to build the article against layout standards seems a bit counterproductive. The endemic stage might be an opportunity to start righting course. I suspect there's a lot of undue info on this article which might be painful to remove: cancelled parades, concerts, etc. SmolBrane (talk) 01:02, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

Maybe that would be the best way to start--perhaps I will start pruning material that seems undue? This way the article can shrink and it will be much easier to convert into conventional formatting. SmolBrane (talk) 01:06, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

I can absolutely agree with both of you about moving this article into prose ASAP. The toughest part about doing this is to identify what sections the article will cover (gov. response? sports? other events?) while minimizing repetition. I still think adding a statistics section would definitely better the article, since events such as "x people have died from COVID-19" could be removed and placed into a graph unless the statistic is important enough to be tied to an event (ex: lighting up the RI State House to honor the deceased). Currently, I perceive the most important step we should strive to complete is to outline a list of sections (which may be influenced by other states' pages) and start to categorize information based on these sources. I feel as if the greatest percent of this information will originate from the early phases of the pandemic (including before the first case was introduced in the States), since restrictions have been lifted numerous times and many pre-pandemic events have been restored in one form or another (parades, schools, etc.). Clearly, the number of meaningful "events" being updated on the page has sharply decreased throughout the last year.

My only concern is actually defining the term "endemic" within the scope of Rhode Island, since there are currently varying arguments as to when the COVID-19 pandemic can be shifted to an "endemic" (as of now, all of RI's counties are in the "medium" level of transmission, as outlined by the CDC). From my statistics, the case fatality rate continues to improve, but one may raise the question: how low does this need to get for the pandemic to be reclassified as an endemic (since our goal is to decrease the fatality rate as much as possible, implying that the disease is indeed treatable)? This is definitely a rigorous term to describe, especially since it is absolutely possible that there could be an annual resurgence of the virus similar to Influenza A ("the flu"). There would most likely have to be a professional declaration of the endemic before the word could properly be used in the article.

As of now, I'll continue to update COVID-19 data to the best of my ability (since my college semester finished a few weeks ago, I have more time to work on figuring out how to create graphs on Wikipedia). I will also continue to brainstorm what statistics are most important to mention if we do create a section for that. I have a Google Sheet of statistics I keep track of, and many of the graphs I have created may be of use (or ones similar). Bowser498 (talk) 06:17, 3 June 2022 (UTC)

Another option here would be to model the structure off an existing states' structure, like COVID-19 pandemic in California or similar. As for 'endemic' and the use of the term, like usual this is resolved by the source: the state ministry of health used the term, and it ended up in the headline for the source too. The word was also used on the citation for Mar 7. As for stats--they usually end up on a sub article eventually--I personally have a strong distaste for articles that suffer on navigability in favor of more info. It looks like a significant undertaking and I don't have experience so I won't make any promises about resolving this--I'm not directing a lot of time at wiki right now. Happy editing regardless! SmolBrane (talk) 06:15, 5 June 2022 (UTC)