My understanding is that in many countries, the "Covid-19 deaths" count is the number of people who tested positive (i.e. confirmed cases) who subsequently died

My understanding is that in many countries, the "Covid-19 deaths" count is the number of people who tested positive (i.e. confirmed cases) who subsequently died. This is different to the way deaths are normally attributed to a cause, in that every single death of a person who tested positive is recorded as a Covid-19 death regardless of the severity of their Covid-19 symptoms or any other factors. This has an upward pressure on the reported Covid-19 mortality vs. other diseases. Separately from that, in any country there are of course people dying who were not tested before death and thus were not a confirmed case. They are not recorded as Covid-19 deaths. This has a downward pressure on the reported Covid-19 mortality. The relative magnitude of the upward pressure and the downward pressure are pretty much unknown at this point.