COVID Track and Trace - so annoyed

[ScribblingPixie]

Just had a call from Track and Trace to tell me I've been named as a contact. As if that wasn't irritating enough they asked for my age, ethnicity and 'whether I identified as male or female'. I said, well, I AM female, and the woman on the phone said, "Yes, quite, absolutely." then she said "I think they're wanting to see how the disease affects the sexes" So I said if they want to see how COVID affects the sexes, asking how I identify isn't going to help. At the end of the phone call there was the chance to set down any objections so thought it was worth a heads up. But honestly, I'm still shaking my head over the priorities on display here.

Ok, it was NHSTracing, I was too irritated to give the right name!

Yeah what does identifying as really work when you ar3 trying to collect medical data.

It’s bonkers

How infuriating. This crap is everywhere but when it involves medical data it's even more worrying.

Seriously - how stupid is that?

When it has already become clear that because of sex, race, age (and class) the virus impacts people differently you would think that would absolutely want to know what your sex is.

They could have at least asked you sex, and then how you identify just to stop the rainbow tribe have a tantrum.

And just to be serious, if you are a trans woman and were hospitalised through Covid but you insist that a hospital treats you as though you are biologically female, seems totally irresponsible when you are biological male.

You'd think a bloody pandemic would focus people's attention on the fact that biology is not something you can identify in and out of. You might as well ask someone what age they identify as (actually, we kind of had this with my Dad, insisting he didn't feel old and therefore the advice to the over 70s didn't apply. He's still sulking that me and my brother won't bring his grandkids around).

There's good evidence that Covid-19 is more likely to kill men, but women may be more likely to have long-term illness. But how can we know for certain if they keep messing with the stats like this?

Well done for pushing back. Being honest about our biological realities in the medical context will actually help both female and male people, no matter any of them identifies.

Wishing you good health, Pixie!

The illness can be harsher on male people so it is very important to find out about sex. I am not sure why finding out about gender identity would matter in this context at all.

Thanks for the heads up OP, if I get the call from T&T I'm going to be prepared with my answer: "my sex is female, but if I identify as male will my covid risk increase?"

@TheCuriousMonkey

Thanks for the heads up OP, if I get the call from T&T I'm going to be prepared with my answer: "my sex is female, but if I identify as male will my covid risk increase?"

That is a lovely way of putting it.

Thanks, Spinach. All good so far.

Good answer CuriousMonkey! The NHS caller felt the same way as me, I could tell, but was just going along with it - but that way madness lies.

Why would they not collect sex data as well as gender identity? Bonkers.

Can anyone point us all in the direction of official UK data that breaks down Covid 19 affliction by eg sex, ethnicity, age.

Thank you.

www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/articles/updatingethniccontrastsindeathsinvolvingthecoronaviruscovid19englandandwales/deathsoccurring2marchto28july2020

Ah. ONS. However only up to July (Updated Oct).

Very interesting breakdown.

Ah. Ethnicity breakdown is easy to find.

Breakdown by Sex is proving a rabbit hole.

I'm glad you told us this - If they contact me I'll complain about that too! Utterly ridiculous!