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I’m not an expert, but after spending the past 2 hours interviewing over 20 students, I‘m confident that the NYTimes list identifying UAB as the nation’s top college for COVID cases is in fact likely deeply misleading, as UAB said in a statement earlier today. THREAD 1/X
First some context. The Times published an article today that included a list of the American universities and colleges w/ the highest number of COVID cases. #1 was UAB, with 972 cases to date. 2/X https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/us/covid-college-cases-tracker.html
But the @nytimes list included an asterisk next to @UABNews (the only school with over 250 cases with such an asterisk) indicating that the case “[t]otal is known to include cases from a medical school, medical center, teaching hospital or clinical setting.” 3/X
And as my @aldotcom colleague @RamseyArchibald wrote earlier today, UAB took issue with being put on top of such a prominent and potentially detrimental list given that massive caveat. 4/X https://www.al.com/news/2020/08/uab-responds-to-misleading-report-ranking-it-as-no-1-college-campus-in-us-for-coronavirus-cases.html
Here’s what the dean of UAB’s medical school had to say about it. 5/X
It does not appear that the New York Times has changed the article or list, or added any additional clarifying language to help people understand why UAB has such a high number of cases. Instead, UAB is still at the top of the list with the asterisk in place. 6/X
Anyways... I live in Birmingham maybe 15 minutes from the UAB campus so I decided I’d see what students had to say. The consensus is no one believes the number and all indications show me that the university is taking COVID precautions very seriously 7/X
I’ve been to several states since March. I’ve interviewed people in multiple towns across Alabama. And I’ve driven through several others. The UAB students who were out on campus this evening had the highest rate of mask compliance that I’ve seen anywhere. Easily over 90%. 8/X
Social distancing rules are also being followed to a very high degree. Students waiting to get dinner in the dining hall lined up several feet apart in a single file line and were not allowed to linger once they got their to-go bags (no indoor dining is allowed.) 9/X
And the university is enforcing strict health checks. Every day, students have to attest that they don’t have any symptoms and answer other health questions online to get a daily health “passport” that they have to show in order to enter buildings on campus. 10/X
Students aren’t allowed to enter dorms they don’t live in, and students all told me that is being strictly enforced. Every student I spoke to said there have been no parties or bar nights that they are aware of this year. And most classes are all online. 11/X
Jamaal Burks, a UAB sophomore from Decatur, AL, told me he thinks “things are a lot safer here than a lot of other places ... If you don’t have a health check you can’t be around other people, you can’t go to the rec center, the bookstore the library or other places.” 12/X
Asked if she believed the NYT report, UAB freshman Emma Chippindale said “there’s no way. Not with all the things we have to do. We take a daily health check ... I went to the rec center today & I felt so safe. They make you spray down the machines before after you use them” 13/X
While they were glad the school is taking aggressive prevention measures, many students did express sadness over the aspects of the stereotypical college experience that they’re missing out on due to the pandemic. 14/X
Darpha Carson, a freshman from Birmingham, said he “was looking forward to visiting friends in other dorms” & “the social aspect of college.” But he’s glad UAB is proactive abt COVID because he hopes it means “we’ll make it through the school year” w/o sending students home. 15/X
To wrap this up, as I noted at the outset, I’m not an expert or a doctor. This is all anecdotal. But if what I saw today is any indication, UAB & its students are taking the pandemic as seriously as anyone could hope they would. Hope this was helpful. Thanks for reading. 16/16
Two quick thread additions: #1: I’ll have a story on this publishing tomorrow morning on @aldotcom. #2: Here is UAB’s tweet with its full official statement criticizing the Times list: https://twitter.com/uabsom/status/1298657390796185600?s=21
