Lieberman: Hey, Johnson, how are you coming along on that official government mortality study regarding the share of hospital patients dying, according to whether they were admitted with gunshot wounds or not?
Johnson: It’s looking more and more like getting shot helps you with survival.
Lieberman: Really? How so?
Johnson: Well, when someone comes in with a gunshot wound, sometimes they are in intensive care for a long time. But I don’t mark them down as suffering from a gunshot wound until 14 days after they’ve actually been shot. If they die before them, I categorize the death as being one in someone who is “not shot.”
Lieberman: Is there any logic behind that potentially-pernicious method which you have personally adopted for categorizing hospital deaths in official government accounting?
[silence]
Lieberman: Johnson? I asked you a question.
Johnson: What? Well, anyway, as I was saying, all of the statistics point to a benefit of getting shot — because of all of those people who had died in the 14 days before I was willing to consider the possibility that they’ve been shot.
Lieberman: But is there any logic behind …
Johnson [interrupting]: I’m sorry, Lieberman, but I’ve got to go to my performance review where the government is thinking about giving me a few hundred thousand dollars in bonuses due to my work being called “essential.”
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Further Reading: The inspiration for this short story comes from this Substack put out by