Known unknowns - exploring uncertainty in medicine

In 2021, members of IEU worked with the BMJ to develop a series of webinars on specific topics related to aspects of the COVID-19 pandemic in the UK, as it progressed. Following the success of those webinars, a new series of Known Unknown webinars is now looking at other hot topics in public health today.

"There are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns—the ones we don't know we don't know"
- Donald Rumsfeld, speaking about weapons of mass destruction before the Iraq war.

Where those words were used to obfuscate, we hope to illuminate. In a series of webinars The BMJ, with the help of Allyson Pollock and George Davey Smith, will shed light on some areas of medicine and society where the public and patients need answers, but the evidence is lacking.