On 2017 Mar 02, Gwinyai Masukume commented:

In an article he co-authored in The Lancet the late Hans Rosling, internationally acclaimed for giving entertaining and informative videos on global health Maxmen A, 2016, contends the discipline has entered the post-fact era Nordenstedt H, 2016. The article makes a case that in the post-fact era data is tweaked for advocacy purposes, in medical journals, with the inadvertent consequence of misguiding investments needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

In this article on male circumcision for HIV prevention Downs JA, 2017, it is stated that a “systematic review estimated a risk reduction between 38% and 66%” for female-to-male HIV transmission conferred by voluntary medical male circumcision. It is not clarified whether this risk reduction is absolute or relative although the cited systematic review, in its abstract, remarks it is a relative risk reduction Siegfried N, 2009. An article titled, “Misleading communication of risk” Gigerenzer G, 2010, discusses how such risk communication is non-transparent. By omitting the baseline risk the bigger numbers make better headlines and better advocacy. However, Hans Rosling cautioned against operating on tweaked facts designed for advocacy, especially in medical journals, because journals can easily propagate an inaccurate understanding of the situation which can make fixing global health problems more challenging Maxmen A, 2016 Nordenstedt H, 2016.

On 2017 Mar 02, Gwinyai Masukume commented:

In an article he co-authored in The Lancet the late Hans Rosling, internationally acclaimed for giving entertaining and informative videos on global health Maxmen A, 2016, contends the discipline has entered the post-fact era Nordenstedt H, 2016. The article makes a case that in the post-fact era data is tweaked for advocacy purposes, in medical journals, with the inadvertent consequence of misguiding investments needed to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.

In this article on male circumcision for HIV prevention Downs JA, 2017, it is stated that a “systematic review estimated a risk reduction between 38% and 66%” for female-to-male HIV transmission conferred by voluntary medical male circumcision. It is not clarified whether this risk reduction is absolute or relative although the cited systematic review, in its abstract, remarks it is a relative risk reduction Siegfried N, 2009. An article titled, “Misleading communication of risk” Gigerenzer G, 2010, discusses how such risk communication is non-transparent. By omitting the baseline risk the bigger numbers make better headlines and better advocacy. However, Hans Rosling cautioned against operating on tweaked facts designed for advocacy, especially in medical journals, because journals can easily propagate an inaccurate understanding of the situation which can make fixing global health problems more challenging Maxmen A, 2016 Nordenstedt H, 2016.