The United Nations General Assembly proclaimed 20 October as World Statistics Day. This year 2020 its motto is "Connecting the world with reliable data ". The reason for this celebration focuses on raising awareness of the social value and importance of Statistics in decision making, policy and business, and in science in general. To this end, we disseminate the opinion of Jesús López Fidalgo, president of the Sociedad de Estadística e research Operativa (SEIO) on the use of data in the current pandemic.

This pandemic has appeared totally unexpectedly at a time when science believed, once again, that the solution to almost everything was within reach. For example, the augmented human being, or even immortality, seemed promising. This crisis at plenary session of the Executive Council scientific peak has brought us back down to earth. In scientific terms, we have never known so much gray subject simultaneously put to work in the search for a solution to a single problem. For many, including scientists, the "non-results" have been frustrating. One of the most disheartening aspects has been the inability to get agreement to work together, to multiply the partnership and in particular to collect quality data .

One of the characteristics of the so-called "Big Data" is that the quantity of data may be able to compensate for the lack of quality. However, it cannot be said that we have had a large quantity of data that can make up for the lack of quality, at least so far. We live in a world where we take it for granted that data are capable of changing the course of a country's elections or launching a business to success in a very short time. However, this pandemic has shown us that the world has not been able to unite to face a common enemy, against which we all, without exception, want to fight. On the contrary, we have used it as a weapon to further divide us, not only politically but also scientifically.

Scientists complain about a bad management management assistant , not to call it political. At the same time, society looks with astonishment at scientists or pseudo-scientists who appear as great experts to public opinion, but who do not solve anything. There is a fight to "get on TV", often giving an opinion not based on scientific evidence. It amazes me to hear so many opinions about the efficacy of masks, confinement, mass PCR testing, etc. based solely on intuition staff or what we read in a tweet. But being a scientist also does not give right, or more value, to an opinion of this subject. Science is not based on opinions read or heard here or there.

At the same time it has to be said that very serious scientific programs of study is being carried out all over the world, following its methodology and it takes time, sometimes a lot of time, until proper scientific results are obtained. To do science it is necessary to have good data. In fact the planning and collection of data is an essential part of science. The choice of the right model is also very important for the scientific method. Statistics is present in the whole process of research, from the planning of the collection of data to the communication of the results.

On October 20, 2020 we celebrate World Statistics Day. I would like it to be a day of reflection for scientists, politicians and society in general, on all these aspects. Statistics is the methodological support of modern experimental science and from that position it can contribute to the unity of science in the search for truth. I think it is not pretentious to say that Statistics is the most powerful tool of the XXI century to better understand the world around us (including epidemics); in the same way that Galileo Galilei used a telescope to unravel the mysteries of the Solar System in the seventeenth century or Edison changed the world with the invention of electric light.