Undermines· strongCOV-E011
The 2023 erratum: support for multiple introductions cut roughly fourteenfold
- what the source states
- "the frequency of simulated topologies matching phylogenetic structures arising from a single introduction was incorrectly reported because of an error in the code, which has been corrected. Correspondingly, the Bayes factors in favor of multiple introductions of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) into the human population relative to a single introduction were overestimated. The text now represents the corrected Bayes factors and topology frequency (Fig. 2C), which still favors the multiple introduction scenario."
- what we infer
- A substantive correction to the case's most diagnostic quantitative claim, recorded as prominently as the finding it corrects. Comparing the two published versions gives the magnitude the erratum text omits: Bayes factors fell from 61.6 and 60.0 to 4.3 and 4.2, the authors' own wording moved from "strong" to "substantial" support, and the simulation frequency of the single-introduction topology rose from 0.5 to 3.1 percent. Both directions of overstatement are worth naming: the original figures should no longer be cited, and the characterization that the correction reduced the finding to negligible is contradicted by the erratum's own sentence that the corrected analysis still favors multiple introductions.
- limitations
- The erratum states no numbers; the magnitudes here come from comparing the two published versions of the parent paper.
- Read via a dated archive snapshot because the repository deposit carries metadata only.