Why Don't Coronavirus Testing Numbers Add Up? It's A 'Glitch'

CHICAGO — Gov. J.B. Pritzker is not a fan of my "reprehensible" stories about his family's stay-at-home order hypocrisy. His smug spokeswoman doesn't return my messages. Media wranglers at the state public health department won't answer questions over the phone.

The governor's administration seems to rely on a pandemic news trend: Publish whatever Pritzker says as if it's true.

But there are a lot of people out there, like me, who want Pritzker to be held accountable to Illinoisans. They want honesty they don't always get from his administration.

And when it comes to coronavirus testing statistics that have been either bungled or manipulated by several states and the CDC, they'd really appreciate it if somebody in the Pritzker administration would show some proof that they're not doing the same to make headlines, win political points and, most importantly, control the population with statistical fibs.

One of those people is Erik Sheldon from McHenry County, an accountant who crunches data for fun.

Every day since May 4, Sheldon has downloaded the county-by-county testing totals posted on the Illinois Department of Public Health's website. On Thursday he sent me a note and a spreadsheet.

"Like yourself, I have been tracking and trending the case positivity rate, looking for irregularities and/ or other outliers. ... As you called out, the county totals for tests are well below the total state count," he wrote.

Sheldon found that when you add up county testing totals including Chicago, "out of state" and "unassigned" categories the sum is about 40,000 tests short of the statewide total Pritzker claims makes Illinois No. 1 in COVID-19 testing (over seven days among the 10 most populous states.)

Every day, the spreadsheet calculation showed the statewide test total was between 1,100 and 2,400 fewer than the sum of its parts. Until, Wednesday. That's when Sheldon noticed an "anomaly."

"Instead of the gap widening, it actually shrunk by almost 8,000 tests. Do you have any insight as to what may be contributing to this?" he wrote.

My guess is some bureaucrat massages the testing numbers to make the governor look good. But to be sure I emailed public health officials to find out. Amazingly, I got a quick reply.

"We have received your inquiry and thank you for bringing it to our attention. It appears there is a glitch in the table for tabulating county test totals," a spokesperson wrote. "The total statewide tests is correct, but it is not showing the correct county per county."

The spokesperson said bar charts on the state's COVID-19 website shows the correct totals.

"Illinois currently is not reporting tests results for antibody testing and does not include those who test positive for antibodies as positive COVID-19 cases," the email states.

What the public health department's response doesn't say is whether antibody specimens are being reported among the total number of tests given in Illinois.

I forwarded the message on to Sheldon. "That answer is a bunch of garbage, honestly," he replied.

Sheldon said he quickly compared the data in the bar chart with the county-by-county table. The numbers still didn't add up.

I passed on his concerns to the public health department and asked someone to call me to explain the "glitch" and answer other questions. No one called.

I asked Sheldon why he even cared about the testing totals that have been making headlines without much fact-checking?

"Data appeals to me," he said. "Trying to find information that doesn't wreak of bias is very challenging. We're being given a message by the governor and his administration saying, 'We've got the numbers. Trust us, and we'll tell you what's going on.' Well, I'm more of the opinion of trust and verify. And when what they're saying doesn't align with the data they're publishing, it's time to push back. It comes down to accountability."

For months now, Pritzker has been ruling by executive order, accountable to no one. He dodges tough questions, use the vile rhetoric of a few to deflect criticism of many and, in a pinch, attacks reporters seeking honest answers.

Guys like Sheldon and me, share the same take on the state's lack of openness about COVID-19 statistics.

"To me, it seems [the Pritzker administration] is being standoffish about explaining the testing information and that's a little bit alarming to be honest," Sheldon said. "Obviously if you control the data you can also control the message. That might sound a little accusatory but I don't think I'm completely in the wrong. If [Pritzker] want's people to really trust what he's saying he needs to be a little more open and honest about it."

I've grown tired of Pritzker's non-answers. So, I forwarded a question to state public health director Dr. Ngozi Ezike during the governor's televised coronavirus update: How can you assure people Illinois is not manipulating testing data in the same way the Associated Press has reported in other states?

Ezike said, in a rambling way, that the public health department is handling so much data delivered digitally and by fax from so many sources that "you know, that yes, maybe, there might be numbers that'll be off."

"We do have quality assurance people who are looking at the data making sure that it all adds up. But I'll just say when you're dealing with hundreds of thousands of pieces of data it is possible that they aren't going to be a perfect add up. But I don't think they are off by much," she said. "And I think our data teams ... are constantly doing our data quality assurance to make sure we get those things to add up as closely as possible."

Sheldon didn't feel assured. "Lol! Nice non-answer," he wrote in an email.

I'm not satisfied by the doctor's reply, either. Her public health department won't release details about where the data is coming from, what it includes and any details about how the information is sorted – and who is in charge of sorting it (bureaucrats or data scientists) — before it's distributed to the public as trusted guidepost for the government's pandemic response.

"The fact is the data is being used to drive the phased openings. If they expect us to go along with that, you've got to make sure you're being honest and transparent and provide a better demonstration of the numbers," Sheldon told me.

"The apparent lack of transparency kind of unnerves me. ... Obviously, they don't have to spell out every piece of information but there should be greater transparency so the average Tom, Dick and Harry, like me, can go through it and say I understand whether this jibes with what they're saying or not."

Sheldon used the state's data and formula to calculate the percentage of positive coronavirus test results in McHenry County and found a 5 percentage point difference from what the Pritzker administration publicly reported.

The discrepancy only raised more questions for Sheldon: "It makes me wonder if they delayed the phased reopening by fictitiously elevating the numbers. That's a real question, not a speculation," he said. "Are they using these numbers to manipulate the population?"

What a reprehensible question, Mr. Sheldon.

You heard the Pritzker administration: It's just a data glitch.

Mark Konkol, recipient of the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for local reporting and Emmy-nominated producer, was a producer, writer and narrator for the "Chicagoland" docu-series on CNN. He was a consulting producer on the Showtime documentary, "16 Shots."
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