4 ms·

q for you: early on, there was a big variance (region vs region, one region over time, etc) in how mortality was reported, e.g. heart attack vs COVID, single ca

by asah 6y ago

q for you: early on, there was a big variance (region vs region, one region over time, etc) in how mortality was reported, e.g. heart attack vs COVID, single cause vs multi-cause, etc. Is mortality more standardized now?

craftinator 6y ago
I've been wondering this myself; last I heard (2 months ago, fairly credible investigative journalism), there was a massive disconnect, state to state, how COVID-19 deaths were assessed and recorded. IIRC, Florida was on one end of the spectrum, tagging deaths as from any comorbidity present (only tagging as COVID if they couldn't find anything else), to California, which was tagging as COVID without test confirmation, if enough of the symptoms were present.
- username90 6y ago
  California and Florida have about the same gap between excess mortality and registered covid deaths, with Florida being slightly better. You can see it here: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/05/us/coronavirus-death-toll-us.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/05/us/coronaviru...
- sunsetMurk 6y ago
  Do you have any links/sources for this?
- spfzero 6y ago
  I think the CDC numbers say that, at least nationwide, 6% of deaths list only Cov 19 as the cause of death. 94% list other causes. This data is so messy, I don't think there is much of a take away. Of the 6%, could there have been other reasons which were missed? Certainly some. Of the 94%, would they have died anyway sans Cov 19? Certainly not all, and not then. As others have pointed out, we should pay attention to the delta in deaths over some other year with an average flu season, and a year with a bad flu season. Someone will run these numbers at the end of 2020, I hope, and then we'll have a better idea of the effect of this particular pandemic.
  - chrisco255 6y ago
    They've already been running those numbers and they're available on CDC's website: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm (Scroll way down for the chart) We had a bad 4-6 weeks a couple months ago but we're already down in the range of a normal flu season as far as deaths go.
  - jjeaff 6y ago
    I'm pretty sure 6% was deaths where "only" covid was listed. In most cases, doctors are more specific. So they may put covid & pneumonia. Pneumonia being any infection of the lower respiratory system. Which would in almost all cases, be caused by covid unless they also had a separate infection. Doctors will also often list complicating factors like obesity (45% of Americans are clinically obese). This is actually right along with the confusion of the public and media for the official coroner's report. The coroner listed cardiopulmonary arrest as the cause of death "complicated by" (in other words "brought on by") someone pinning him to the ground and blocking his airway. Drugs in his system and prior health conditions were listed in the report as any thorough coroner's report should. But they were not listed as complicating factors for his death. Cardiopulmonary arrest is -not- a heart attack. (that's a myocardial infarction). It means your heart stopped pumping and your lungs stopped functioning. Which is how most people die.
beagle3 6y ago
Not GP. In my opinion, the only reliable measure is excess death (if you believe death count, which I trust for most countries, but not all countries), because it is invariant to these (often political) classifications. See e.g.[0] (it is up-to-date for 11-sep, despite the link date saying April 21). In fact, these graphs would look the same even if you didn't have access to any testing/diagnostics/causes-of-death. It is easily visible which countries have gone back to baseline, which countries haven't, and which didn't even have a "first wave", which likely means that they are in great danger of one happening. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronavirus-missing-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronav...

by asah 6y ago

craftinator 6y ago

I've been wondering this myself; last I heard (2 months ago, fairly credible investigative journalism), there was a massive disconnect, state to state, how COVID-19 deaths were assessed and recorded. IIRC, Florida was on one end of the spectrum, tagging deaths as from any comorbidity present (only tagging as COVID if they couldn't find anything else), to California, which was tagging as COVID without test confirmation, if enough of the symptoms were present.

username90 6y ago
California and Florida have about the same gap between excess mortality and registered covid deaths, with Florida being slightly better. You can see it here: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/05/us/coronavirus-death-toll-us.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/05/05/us/coronaviru...
sunsetMurk 6y ago
Do you have any links/sources for this?
spfzero 6y ago
I think the CDC numbers say that, at least nationwide, 6% of deaths list only Cov 19 as the cause of death. 94% list other causes. This data is so messy, I don't think there is much of a take away. Of the 6%, could there have been other reasons which were missed? Certainly some. Of the 94%, would they have died anyway sans Cov 19? Certainly not all, and not then. As others have pointed out, we should pay attention to the delta in deaths over some other year with an average flu season, and a year with a bad flu season. Someone will run these numbers at the end of 2020, I hope, and then we'll have a better idea of the effect of this particular pandemic.
- chrisco255 6y ago
  They've already been running those numbers and they're available on CDC's website: https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm (Scroll way down for the chart) We had a bad 4-6 weeks a couple months ago but we're already down in the range of a normal flu season as far as deaths go.
- jjeaff 6y ago
  I'm pretty sure 6% was deaths where "only" covid was listed. In most cases, doctors are more specific. So they may put covid & pneumonia. Pneumonia being any infection of the lower respiratory system. Which would in almost all cases, be caused by covid unless they also had a separate infection. Doctors will also often list complicating factors like obesity (45% of Americans are clinically obese). This is actually right along with the confusion of the public and media for the official coroner's report. The coroner listed cardiopulmonary arrest as the cause of death "complicated by" (in other words "brought on by") someone pinning him to the ground and blocking his airway. Drugs in his system and prior health conditions were listed in the report as any thorough coroner's report should. But they were not listed as complicating factors for his death. Cardiopulmonary arrest is -not- a heart attack. (that's a myocardial infarction). It means your heart stopped pumping and your lungs stopped functioning. Which is how most people die.

beagle3 6y ago

Not GP. In my opinion, the only reliable measure is excess death (if you believe death count, which I trust for most countries, but not all countries), because it is invariant to these (often political) classifications. See e.g.[0] (it is up-to-date for 11-sep, despite the link date saying April 21). In fact, these graphs would look the same even if you didn't have access to any testing/diagnostics/causes-of-death. It is easily visible which countries have gone back to baseline, which countries haven't, and which didn't even have a "first wave", which likely means that they are in great danger of one happening. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronavirus-missing-deaths.html https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/04/21/world/coronav...