There's Not Much Point in Measuring Stuff Unless You Use the Data Do Intelligent Things With Policy?

A number of my friends (old, recycled academics, like myself) have pointed out that the media, surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic, tends to be full of numbers (about how many tests have been carried out, people from different age cohorts dying within 28 days of a positive Covid test, guestimates of the incidences of asymptomatic and 'Long-Covid' patients, likelihoods of people honestly self-isolating etc etc). What seems to be (at least comparatively) lacking is clear input from Operational Research (OR) experts. So, data appears to be collected by scientists and medics but the decisions on what to do about the findings, seems to be largely determined by politicians. If one looks hard enough, there are some examples of OR being involved in Covid-19 decision making. For example, Applied Research Collaboration for the SW Peninsula, has a number of projects aiming to support the NHS through operational research (https://www.arc-swp.nihr.ac.uk/research/supporting-nhs-or). The focus is on medicine but limited to Devon and the surrounding area. Projects include "Using intelligent sample pooling to increase the UK Covid-19 screening capacity" and "Modelling to support a Covid-19 screening 'super-lab'". Is all this going on in the background of UK-wide deliberations or do the politicians feel they don't need (or even wellcome?) input from OR specialists? One certainly sees very little about this type of expertise in the media. Never mind the quality, feel the width?