>Imagine that everything known about the COVID-19 pandemic was based on people giving their best guesses about whether they have the virus, instead of highly re

>Imagine that everything known about the COVID-19 pandemic was based on people giving their best guesses about whether they have the virus, instead of highly reliable medical tests. Now imagine that people who actually have the virus are more likely to misdiagnose themselves. The consequences of relying on this unreliable measure would be far-reaching. Why do we need to imagine something that actually takes place? Phase 3 trials of vaccines relied on self-reporting of symptoms by participants. E.g: https://cdn.pfizer.com/pfizercom/2020-11/C4591001_Clinical_Protocol_Nov2020.pdf https://cdn.pfizer.com/pfizercom/2020-11/C4591001_Clinical_P... See section 8.13. COVID-19 Surveillance (All Participants). A lot of other medical research relies on self-reporting of symptoms as well.