German Diesel Crisis: New Problem

It came out this morning via ARD (public TV, Channel One) that a intellectual war over math is now reshaping the whole discussion over the diesel particle crisis in Germany.

So here is the basic 'math' story.  There's a 'think-tank' operation within the Helmholtz Institute (Mainz, created in 2009), which sat down in 2018, and used statistical methods to scientifically state that the relationship with diesel's nitrogen dioxide particles (the bad stuff) and lung disease....with 2014 data....equals around (roughly) 6,000 Germans dying early in life.  Numbers-wise, it all equaled...but there is one problem (which was stated by noted epidemiologist and math-wiz Professor Peter Morfeld (Ruhr University)....it's unscientific.

Yes....pure and simple....unscientific. 

The problem is that you can't say in a prediction sort of way.....that they died via the particles business.  You would have to go and examine the death certificate of every German who died in 2014, and then reach a conclusion that those with breathing issues caused their death, and they were linked to nitrogen dioxide particles. 

In this case, I would even suggest that if you did come up with 6,000 death certificates which matched up.....the next question would be if they all lived in urbanized areas.  If 700 of them lived in highly rural areas, or mountainous regions....then it'd probably lead to a faulty assessment.

Professor Morfeld even states in a blunt way....the data in the report simply can't be trusted.

This puts the national agency over the environment into a tough position, and invites more scientific discussion....something that the environmental folks probably won't be happy about.  Judges stuck in this ban chatter by city leaders?  I'm guessing that they are willing now to delay the individual city-ban business until this gets sorted out.