12 ms·

Coronavirus: Iran cover-up of deaths revealed by data leak

186 points by thdespou 6y ago

zkid18 6y ago
I appreciate the journalist's work, but I still confused if there is exist the standart way to count COVID-19 death. > Tehran, the capital, has the highest number of deaths with 8,120 people who died with COVID-19 or symptoms similar to it. Not sure how Iran had formalized the similar symptoms and if they count death from another deceases that were triggered by COVID-19. Imo the cover-up reasons seems weak.
- armada651 6y ago
  > Not sure how Iran had formalized the similar symptoms and if they count death from another deceases that were triggered by COVID-19. Why would you want to make that distinction and not count those people with pre-existing diseases who died as a consequence of contracting COVID-19? For example weak cardiovascular health in overweight people already puts them at higher risk of dying after contracting COVID-19. I don't see why anyone would not count those cases unless they want to paint a rosier picture.
  - zkid18 6y ago
    For the sake of clear experiment I would distinguish those cases and mark them as a consequences of contacting COVID-19. The stats about the total number of death seems quite noisy.
- DangerousPie 6y ago
  The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. That way you're not relying on testing capabilities and you're not relying on how different countries define a death due to COVID. You're simply asking "how many more people have died this year than would have died normally". Of course this will also include deaths not directly caused by infections with the virus. But it gives an overall picture of the impact of the virus and its downstream effects on a country and allows comparisons between countries.
  - zkid18 6y ago
    Exactly, but the the environment different as well. I don't have a stat to support my arguments but I bet that the quarantine measurements have lower the number of death from car accidents or from cardiovascular-disease. Also given the dramatic economical consequences of quarantine people have become more stressful than usual.
  - coldtea 6y ago
    >The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. Might be the better, or more illuminating way, but it's a standard for whom? Most western governments report covid deaths it in a totally different way - not by taking into any account excess deaths. So it's not like Iran is doing anything special in this regard...
  - Traster 6y ago
    That's a measure of deaths due to the coronavirus pandemic, not a count of the number of deaths from coronavirus. It's important to note that in the UK, fewer deaths than the average year were measured at the beginning of the pandemic because routine and non-emergency medical procedures were cancelled or postponed.
  - tremon 6y ago
    The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. Yes, but you can only do that in aggregate over a larger period, you can't use it as a basis for daily statistics, not in the least because not all deaths are recorded the same day they occur. The daily death tallies are based on confirmed cases only, in pretty much every country. That means underreporting of cases is the norm, not the exception [0]. I must say those graphs are a bit hard to interpret, but if I understand correctly: a gray bulge above the dark gray dotted line implies excess deaths not officially attributed to Covid-19. From those figures, it seems only Denmark and Germany are accurately reporting Covid deaths, and Belgium, France and the US may be overreporting the death tally (although it can also mean that not all deaths in the past weeks have been recorded yet in the official figures). [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/may/29/excess-deaths-uk-has-one-highest-levels-europe https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/may/29...
Synaesthesia 6y ago
Looking at number of total deaths, it's possible a lot of countries are undercounting coronavirus deaths.
- andialo 6y ago
  It's also interesting to look at the trend. The daily number of deaths to the daily number of cases has dropped rapidly all around the world. Not sure why but it's a very good sign. If I saw this trend only in a handful of countries I'd say they are undercounting (FWIW I still think they are) but because we can see this in US, EU and Asia, it'd say virus is getting less deadly/treatment is getting significantly better.
  - 488643689 6y ago
    Could also mean we test more people, register more mild cases.
    - acqq 6y ago
      > we test more people, register more mild cases. That, and the age structure of the infected changed: the older people are doing what they can to avoid the infection, if they are able to do that. Also, across the world, different measures are still in place, changing the dynamics of the spread, compared to the start of the pandemic when the spread was practically unconstrained. The dynamics of the spreading is also different in different settings. There's no any scientific reason to believe that "the virus" changed in any way biologically. It's the world that does its best to adapt. Also, the schools and the universities are not opened for students at the moment in many countries, also slowing down the spreading. Edit: answer to: "Viruses don’t mutate?" The coronaviruses have additional mechanisms to correct the copying, slowing down the mutations, compared to e.g. flu viruses. Edit2: answering: "The main reason for why Coronaviruses don't mutate much is because they don't have to": I wouldn't call that "the main reason", but it's a part of their success. Coronaviruses have longer genome than many other viruses, and having uncontrolled mutations in that longer genome would make them degrade too fast, so there is that molecular mechanism they have, correcting the copying errors. Additionally, they have other mechanisms to recombine their genetic material, something like "sex between (corona)viruses" where even more than two parents could be possible. But that's different from mutations and happens under different conditions. Knowing all that, and all that what est31 mentions, it is indeed true, the coronaviruses really simply don't need to "mutate fast." Edit3: "There different strains" is not true. They are different isolates, where the completely minor differences exist, but for all it is known, until somebody proves otherwise, and nobody has, there is still just a single "strain" of SARS-CoV-2. Edit4: Thanks to Gibbon1, yes, comparing with influenza is tricky, but maybe it's good to give readers the idea once again that this is surely not flu and that the viruses aren't the same and don't behave the same.
stunt 6y ago
They maintain two lists. Official list is whomever they checked positive for COVID-19 before or after death. Second list which has leaked now is people who had died with suspicious symptoms but not tested for COVID-19 for whatever reason. They admitted way before this that they believe real death toll might be 3 times higher than official numbers, and real infected might be up to 5 times higher than official numbers by comparing average/expected death rate and clinics reports. I think this is an issue in many countries right now. The numbers are real as much as they get to test their population and everyone knows that.
- hnarn 6y ago
  It should be trivial to calculate excess deaths compared to the same period averaged over last X years, so if countries cared about transparency they could just share that, and the issue of non tested deaths would be somewhat minimized.
  - SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    That statistic wouldn't be tremendously easy to interpret, since you'd have to account for the expected distribution of the differential and any secondary effects which the public health response might have caused. These effects aren't negligible and could easily produce errors similar in scale to what the BBC's calling a cover-up.
    - hnarn 6y ago
      > secondary effects which the public health response might have caused You're correct, but this is still relevant. It all depends on how the statistic is presented. Excess deaths shouldn't be presented as "deaths due to Covid-19 infection", but it could be presented as "deaths related to the Covid-19 outbreak", and people who died from cardiovascular disease because they didn't seek help due to the pandemic are still very much relevant since they are just that: related to the Covid-19 outbreak. After all, if you save 100 people in ICUs after they contracted Covid-19 that's good, but if 1 000 people die of other causes because they were scared to go to hospital then that is still relevant to understanding how the pandemic affected deaths in general, and how the response could be improved in the future compared across countries.
knolax 6y ago
More mud-flinging. Maybe the BBC should look closer at the shitshow at home.
- hardlianotion 6y ago
  What are the BBC missing at home, do you think?
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- NietTim 6y ago
  Such a simple minded reply, the BBC can do both at the same time.
  - knolax 6y ago
    Except it doesn't, and the evidence of "coverup" they have is laughably bad. Of course you're too busy trying to think of the best way to sound snarky to actually think about the topic at hand.
    - NietTim 6y ago
      You seem like a nice person. Bye!
      - knolax 6y ago
        You seem like an asshole. I feel sorry for the people who have to deal with you in real life.
Traster 6y ago
I'm sorry but I'm finding it very difficult to see how this isn't straight up propaganda from the BBC. >The number of deaths from coronavirus in Iran is nearly triple what Iran's government claims, a BBC Persian service investigation has found. This is false. There is a very important distinction between confirmed deaths due to coronavirus, and deaths of people who may have shown some coronavirus symptoms. One is clearly an undercount, one is clearly an overcount and they aren't measuring the same thing. So to publish on your state broadcaster a story deliberately mis-representing that fact is a bad move. The data even shows that the confirmed coronavirus deaths track proportionately to suspected coronavirus deaths - actually showing that it's highly unlikely that the numbers are being manipulated. If you go here: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ the UK government gives the exact same measure that Iran uses as their official number.
- pasabagi 6y ago
  To be fair, the BBC is about as independent as your average non-state media company, and definitely less entangled with the past five governments than anything owned by Murdoch. That said, it is a bit awkward, given the UK's own undercounting.
  - seamyb88 6y ago
    > To be fair, the BBC is about as independent as your average non-state media company, and definitely less entangled with the past five governments than anything owned by Murdoch. Absolutely not true. From propagating the idea that life-long advocate of equality, Jeremy Corbyn, is antisemitic, to sending well-fed journos out on boats to chase migrants (never people, migrants) around asking them what they want, the BBC is a Conservative mouth-piece.
    - nickcox 6y ago
      Not to mention _literally_ portraying the chancellor as Superman. [1] [1] https://www.thenational.scot/news/18620765.bbc-slammed-portraying-rishi-sunak-superman/ https://www.thenational.scot/news/18620765.bbc-slammed-portr...
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
dsabanin 6y ago
Russian cover up is still waiting to be exposed.

186 points by thdespou 6y ago

I appreciate the journalist's work, but I still confused if there is exist the standart way to count COVID-19 death. > Tehran, the capital, has the highest number of deaths with 8,120 people who died with COVID-19 or symptoms similar to it. Not sure how Iran had formalized the similar symptoms and if they count death from another deceases that were triggered by COVID-19. Imo the cover-up reasons seems weak.

armada651 6y ago
> Not sure how Iran had formalized the similar symptoms and if they count death from another deceases that were triggered by COVID-19. Why would you want to make that distinction and not count those people with pre-existing diseases who died as a consequence of contracting COVID-19? For example weak cardiovascular health in overweight people already puts them at higher risk of dying after contracting COVID-19. I don't see why anyone would not count those cases unless they want to paint a rosier picture.
- zkid18 6y ago
  For the sake of clear experiment I would distinguish those cases and mark them as a consequences of contacting COVID-19. The stats about the total number of death seems quite noisy.
DangerousPie 6y ago
The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. That way you're not relying on testing capabilities and you're not relying on how different countries define a death due to COVID. You're simply asking "how many more people have died this year than would have died normally". Of course this will also include deaths not directly caused by infections with the virus. But it gives an overall picture of the impact of the virus and its downstream effects on a country and allows comparisons between countries.
- zkid18 6y ago
  Exactly, but the the environment different as well. I don't have a stat to support my arguments but I bet that the quarantine measurements have lower the number of death from car accidents or from cardiovascular-disease. Also given the dramatic economical consequences of quarantine people have become more stressful than usual.
- coldtea 6y ago
  >The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. Might be the better, or more illuminating way, but it's a standard for whom? Most western governments report covid deaths it in a totally different way - not by taking into any account excess deaths. So it's not like Iran is doing anything special in this regard...
- Traster 6y ago
  That's a measure of deaths due to the coronavirus pandemic, not a count of the number of deaths from coronavirus. It's important to note that in the UK, fewer deaths than the average year were measured at the beginning of the pandemic because routine and non-emergency medical procedures were cancelled or postponed.
- tremon 6y ago
  The standard way is to count how many deaths there were in excess of what would be expected in a normal year. Yes, but you can only do that in aggregate over a larger period, you can't use it as a basis for daily statistics, not in the least because not all deaths are recorded the same day they occur. The daily death tallies are based on confirmed cases only, in pretty much every country. That means underreporting of cases is the norm, not the exception [0]. I must say those graphs are a bit hard to interpret, but if I understand correctly: a gray bulge above the dark gray dotted line implies excess deaths not officially attributed to Covid-19. From those figures, it seems only Denmark and Germany are accurately reporting Covid deaths, and Belgium, France and the US may be overreporting the death tally (although it can also mean that not all deaths in the past weeks have been recorded yet in the official figures). [0] https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/may/29/excess-deaths-uk-has-one-highest-levels-europe https://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2020/may/29...

Synaesthesia 6y ago

Looking at number of total deaths, it's possible a lot of countries are undercounting coronavirus deaths.

andialo 6y ago
It's also interesting to look at the trend. The daily number of deaths to the daily number of cases has dropped rapidly all around the world. Not sure why but it's a very good sign. If I saw this trend only in a handful of countries I'd say they are undercounting (FWIW I still think they are) but because we can see this in US, EU and Asia, it'd say virus is getting less deadly/treatment is getting significantly better.
- 488643689 6y ago
  Could also mean we test more people, register more mild cases.
  - acqq 6y ago
    > we test more people, register more mild cases. That, and the age structure of the infected changed: the older people are doing what they can to avoid the infection, if they are able to do that. Also, across the world, different measures are still in place, changing the dynamics of the spread, compared to the start of the pandemic when the spread was practically unconstrained. The dynamics of the spreading is also different in different settings. There's no any scientific reason to believe that "the virus" changed in any way biologically. It's the world that does its best to adapt. Also, the schools and the universities are not opened for students at the moment in many countries, also slowing down the spreading. Edit: answer to: "Viruses don’t mutate?" The coronaviruses have additional mechanisms to correct the copying, slowing down the mutations, compared to e.g. flu viruses. Edit2: answering: "The main reason for why Coronaviruses don't mutate much is because they don't have to": I wouldn't call that "the main reason", but it's a part of their success. Coronaviruses have longer genome than many other viruses, and having uncontrolled mutations in that longer genome would make them degrade too fast, so there is that molecular mechanism they have, correcting the copying errors. Additionally, they have other mechanisms to recombine their genetic material, something like "sex between (corona)viruses" where even more than two parents could be possible. But that's different from mutations and happens under different conditions. Knowing all that, and all that what est31 mentions, it is indeed true, the coronaviruses really simply don't need to "mutate fast." Edit3: "There different strains" is not true. They are different isolates, where the completely minor differences exist, but for all it is known, until somebody proves otherwise, and nobody has, there is still just a single "strain" of SARS-CoV-2. Edit4: Thanks to Gibbon1, yes, comparing with influenza is tricky, but maybe it's good to give readers the idea once again that this is surely not flu and that the viruses aren't the same and don't behave the same.

stunt 6y ago

They maintain two lists. Official list is whomever they checked positive for COVID-19 before or after death. Second list which has leaked now is people who had died with suspicious symptoms but not tested for COVID-19 for whatever reason. They admitted way before this that they believe real death toll might be 3 times higher than official numbers, and real infected might be up to 5 times higher than official numbers by comparing average/expected death rate and clinics reports. I think this is an issue in many countries right now. The numbers are real as much as they get to test their population and everyone knows that.

hnarn 6y ago
It should be trivial to calculate excess deaths compared to the same period averaged over last X years, so if countries cared about transparency they could just share that, and the issue of non tested deaths would be somewhat minimized.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  That statistic wouldn't be tremendously easy to interpret, since you'd have to account for the expected distribution of the differential and any secondary effects which the public health response might have caused. These effects aren't negligible and could easily produce errors similar in scale to what the BBC's calling a cover-up.
  - hnarn 6y ago
    > secondary effects which the public health response might have caused You're correct, but this is still relevant. It all depends on how the statistic is presented. Excess deaths shouldn't be presented as "deaths due to Covid-19 infection", but it could be presented as "deaths related to the Covid-19 outbreak", and people who died from cardiovascular disease because they didn't seek help due to the pandemic are still very much relevant since they are just that: related to the Covid-19 outbreak. After all, if you save 100 people in ICUs after they contracted Covid-19 that's good, but if 1 000 people die of other causes because they were scared to go to hospital then that is still relevant to understanding how the pandemic affected deaths in general, and how the response could be improved in the future compared across countries.

knolax 6y ago

More mud-flinging. Maybe the BBC should look closer at the shitshow at home.

hardlianotion 6y ago
What are the BBC missing at home, do you think?
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
NietTim 6y ago
Such a simple minded reply, the BBC can do both at the same time.
- knolax 6y ago
  Except it doesn't, and the evidence of "coverup" they have is laughably bad. Of course you're too busy trying to think of the best way to sound snarky to actually think about the topic at hand.
  - NietTim 6y ago
    You seem like a nice person. Bye!
    - knolax 6y ago
      You seem like an asshole. I feel sorry for the people who have to deal with you in real life.

Traster 6y ago

I'm sorry but I'm finding it very difficult to see how this isn't straight up propaganda from the BBC. >The number of deaths from coronavirus in Iran is nearly triple what Iran's government claims, a BBC Persian service investigation has found. This is false. There is a very important distinction between confirmed deaths due to coronavirus, and deaths of people who may have shown some coronavirus symptoms. One is clearly an undercount, one is clearly an overcount and they aren't measuring the same thing. So to publish on your state broadcaster a story deliberately mis-representing that fact is a bad move. The data even shows that the confirmed coronavirus deaths track proportionately to suspected coronavirus deaths - actually showing that it's highly unlikely that the numbers are being manipulated. If you go here: https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ https://coronavirus.data.gov.uk/ the UK government gives the exact same measure that Iran uses as their official number.

pasabagi 6y ago
To be fair, the BBC is about as independent as your average non-state media company, and definitely less entangled with the past five governments than anything owned by Murdoch. That said, it is a bit awkward, given the UK's own undercounting.
- seamyb88 6y ago
  > To be fair, the BBC is about as independent as your average non-state media company, and definitely less entangled with the past five governments than anything owned by Murdoch. Absolutely not true. From propagating the idea that life-long advocate of equality, Jeremy Corbyn, is antisemitic, to sending well-fed journos out on boats to chase migrants (never people, migrants) around asking them what they want, the BBC is a Conservative mouth-piece.
  - nickcox 6y ago
    Not to mention _literally_ portraying the chancellor as Superman. [1] [1] https://www.thenational.scot/news/18620765.bbc-slammed-portraying-rishi-sunak-superman/ https://www.thenational.scot/news/18620765.bbc-slammed-portr...

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

dsabanin 6y ago

Russian cover up is still waiting to be exposed.