When opportunist acadmia and agenda driven media combine: Fact check on NDTV news on so-called #COVID19 study
By Amol Pawar
Here is the link of the deleted article with clarification from NDTV
Based on this update, we have deleted the IANS story on this report. https://t.co/3MKAQ9cSlh
— NDTV (@ndtv) March 28, 2020
This report which NDTV has quoted was published by CDDEP (The Center for Disease Dynamics, Economics & Policy). In its COVID-19 study report, CDDEP claims that India will have 300 to 400 Million (i.e. 30 to 40 Crore) Corona positive cases. This report also uses logos of Johns Hopkins University and Princeton University. Ramanan Laxminarayan who has been recently seen on News channel calming million plus deaths of Covid-19 is the director of CDDEP.
What is the truth? Who is “Ramanan Laxminarayan”?
Let's break it one by one. First of all, who is “Ramanan Laxminarayan”? Is he a scientist or epidemiologist? What authority does he or his team have? It turns out that Ramanan is an economist (Ph.D. in economics not a Doctor of Medicine) and BE in Instrumentation from BITS Pilani. He worked with the Public Health Foundation of India (PHFI) and launched two companies without mandatory permission from PHFI. In 2016 PHFI terminated his contract and didn't renew it. While working with PHFI Ramanan stole intellectual property for which PHFI sued him and won the case. Nonetheless, the court made him pay all legal expenses to PHFI as well.
Several media outlets including @IndiaToday , @BBCWorld are telecasting interview of "Epidemiologist" Dr Ramanan Lakshminarayan, who predicted that India will have 200 Million Coronavirus cases. So who is Dr Lakshminarayan?
— Dr Vijay Chauthaiwale (@vijai63) March 22, 2020
Unauthorized use of logos of John Hopkins University and Princeton University:
Taking illegal paths seems to be a common practice of Ramanan Laxminarayan. To make his Covid-19 report more authentic he used logos of John Hopkins University (JHU) and Princeton University (PU). But in an era of social media facts, can't be hidden for so long. A twitter user “Neelakshi Mann” had doubts and she asked JHU and PU to clarify their association with this report. Here is what they replied
The use of our logo was not authorized in this case and JHU is engaging with CDDEP on it. Thank you.
— Johns Hopkins University (@JohnsHopkins) March 26, 2020
We did not authorize this use of our logo. We're looking into it to get things fixed. Thank you.
— Princeton University (@Princeton) March 28, 2020
JHU denied any association with this report and PU said that this is a research done by their students and under validation. Both universities mentioned that they didn't collaborate with the research as a university; hence they do not endorse the report.
Ramanan Laxminarayan’s statistical model “IndiaSIM”
What is the “IndiaSIM” model which Ramanan is discussing in all interviews? IndiaSim is a recently developed i.e. around the 2016 ABM model. It is developed by Dr. Itamar Megiddo who is a lecturer at the Department of Management Science at the University of Strathclyde of Scotland. His Ph.D. guide is Ramanan Laxminaarayan. It is a clear case of academics promoting their study in disguise. Moreover, the CCDEP website claims that they used data from China and Italy in this model and came to a conclusion. We should understand here no such data based on thorough research is available yet.
Generally, statistical models take a long time to mature and gain authenticity. It seems that Ramanan Laxminarayan is interested in promoting his model. Since he knows that it is not yet sufficiently credible, he used the name of John Hopkins University.
NDTV’s fake news based on the fake report
Now the question is, how could NDTV with such resources fail to verify whether the report was fake or real? Or is it the agenda of NDTV which leads to malign itself by publishing fake news for the sake of hate? Having an anti-establishment view is one thing and hating a particular government because they didn't belong or follow your agenda/ideology is another thing.