The Johns Hopkins University's Coronavirus Resource Center is launching the Pandemic Data Initiative as a new resource to spotlight systemic deficiencies in the collecting and reporting of pandemic data, to examine how those challenges hinder COVID-19 responses, and to explore possible solutions to improve public data. Since the pandemic's start, Johns Hopkins University experts at the Coronavirus Resource Center had a behind-the-scenes view on how state, federal, and global agencies collected and reported COVID-19 data. Their analyses revealed a troubling truth: In the absence of standards and uniform methods, the states used an uneven patchwork of policies and disjointed reporting that hampered efforts to slow COVID-19's spread, sowed confusion for policymakers and the public, hindered the ability to target resources to the most vulnerable, and complicated the process of measuring the effectiveness of public health interventions and vaccinations.