..."don't they have an obligation to collect data to know when to ease restrictions?"

WHAT DO YOU THINK THEY'RE DOING!?! Testing is increasing. More data is becoming available. They ARE collecting data to know when to reduce restrictions. Just because they haven't told you what the benchmark is as far as when that will happen doesn't mean they aren't collecting data. I'll even go so far as to say that they may not even KNOW what benchmark they are waiting for. They still may feel the need to collect further data and see how things progress before committing to that. They would have to be idiots to commit to any benchmark before they are absolutely ready to follow through - there are people here on CB ready to crucify them already. If they said "when X happens, restrictions will be reduced" without having enough data to know what it means when X happens - then there WOULD be riots and pandemonium.