> Sure, but it also means these deaths are piled up on top of everything else. It's not like people will stop dying of other causes. You're misunderstanding: t

> Sure, but it also means these deaths are piled up on top of everything else. It's not like people will stop dying of other causes. You're misunderstanding: the people who die of COVID-19 will stop dying of other causes, because they've died of COVID-19. There will be a decrease in other-cause mortality... >In a sense this is a tautology. Of course, if we keep deaths to a low number there won't be an impact on mortality rates. ...thus what it means is that if the COVID-19 deaths are kept to people who are ill enough that they would have died within the year anyway, those deaths won't be extra mortality across the year. If on the other hand COVID-19 spreads a lot and kills people who wouldn't have otherwise died, there will be extra mortality.