6 ms·

The US excess mortality rate from Covid-19 is substantially worse than Europe’s

32 points by hhs 6y ago

paganel 6y ago
A comparison should also be made between obesity rates in Europe vs the US, with the US at a strong disadvantage (because obesity has a strong correlation with higher Covid deaths). The same thing can be said about diabetes, I suspect the US had a higher percentage of persons affected by diabetes compared to Europe. IMHO diabetes is also a strong differentiator between South America and Africa in terms of deaths, I think that higher diabetes incidence in South America was partly to blame for a higher rate of Covid deaths when comparing it to Africa.
- gridlockd 6y ago
  Insinuating that there might something like personal responsibility affecting disease outcome is dangerous business. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBJpYIfDF3A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBJpYIfDF3A
  - paulryanrogers 6y ago
    Mere mention of a fact like obesity differences in population doesn't imply personal responsibility. US has a market, culture, and educational system that's as much to blame as individual choices.
    - gnusty_gnurc 6y ago
      Aside from even examining any of that - it's clear you have a personal bias that makes you want to impute "the US market, culture, and educational system." How convenient that a disease comes along that magically confirms all your priors about the wickedness of American institutions and culture!
      - paulryanrogers 6y ago
        Must we descend into ad hominem attacks? Let's call a spade a spade: - market manipulation [0][1] - culture [2] - education [3] 0. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074/50-years-ago-sugar-industry-quietly-paid-scientists-to-point-blame-at-fat https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074... 1. https://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/food https://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/food 2. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-sugar-increases-the-risk-of-dying-with-heart-disease-201402067021 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-su... 3. https://www.healthyway.com/content/how-did-the-government-get-the-food-pyramid-so-terribly-wrong/ https://www.healthyway.com/content/how-did-the-government-ge...
    - gridlockd 6y ago
      > Mere mention of a fact like obesity differences in population doesn't imply personal responsibility. If there is no personal responsibility whatsoever in obesity, then this statement is true. > US has a market, culture, and educational system that's as much to blame as individual choices. If this statement is true, then there is still some personal responsibility in obesity. Both statements can not be true at the same time. Also, culture and education doesn't absolve anyone from personal responsibility.
      - paulryanrogers 6y ago
        I'm not saying there is no personal responsibility. That's why I wrote "...as much as...". That said, a case could be made that poorly educated consumers, born to a calorie optimized tribe (say islanders), in a market flooded with industrialized food and deceptive marketing would have little hope of avoiding obesity.
- gnusty_gnurc 6y ago
  Vietnam has the lowest obesity rate in the world. Guess how well they've managed to avoid major damage from the virus...
gridlockd 6y ago
The problem with this comparison against "Europe" is that a lot of countries with far lower prevalence are compared against the US. Spain has a similar prevalence, but far higher mortality. UK, France, Italy have comparable mortality, but also significantly lower mortality. However you pick the numbers, there are ways to make the US look better or worse.
- soco 6y ago
  You are right, statistics often get a bad rep, especially when the sources and the mechanism of data slicing is not even mentioned. However, I think this article makes a very good show of what exactly they mean by "Europe" and what numbers make the US look worse. Do you mean you don't agree how they picked their numbers? Because the answer sounds like you didn't actually read the article, just making a general critique at statistics.
  - gridlockd 6y ago
    It doesn't matter, because the headline is the talking point, even if the article itself is so nuanced that it puts the headline into question. I wouldn't say the article itself is bad, it shows you that the difference between EU countries is enormous (Figure 1).
- tluyben2 6y ago
  > Spain has a similar prevalence, but far higher mortality Which numbers[0]; spain only is a bit above (6%) in deaths and below (28%) in prevalence. Belgium is far higher in deaths; there is an actual significant difference (26%) there, but not many people live there ofcourse. Outside the UK (is that still the EU), most countries are a quite far below the US in covid mortality. [0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
  - gridlockd 6y ago
    That is my point, higher prevalence should lead to higher excess mortality, of course. Of all EU countries, only Spain comes close to the US in prevalence. Many countries have far lower prevalence but still comparable mortality. That tells me that when controlled for prevalence, the US actually deals far better with COVID than Europe - most likely because fewer old people got infected. Also, a lot of people died early in the pandemic, when there weren't so many tests.
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]
ceilingcorner 6y ago
Perhaps a naive question: aren’t all these evaluations based on the idea that reported deaths are accurate, globally? That seems like a pretty big flaw.
- wjnc 6y ago
  Yes, that is the case. Look up the Human Mortality Database and it's documentation if you're truly interested. I would say 200+ years of quite adequate data is available for some countries (perhaps undercounting things like infant mortality). My view is that Napoleon taught us well to register future and former tax payers.
glofish 6y ago
I believe these arguments based on mortality rates will, eventually, be considered "racist". And I say that with some trepidation, the label is easily thrown around today. It is almost certain that some sub-populations are more sensitive to COVID19. The causes may be genetic, environmental, cultural. Societies taking equal measures and similar socio economic backgrounds could experience vastly different outcomes for no other reason but the natural response of their bodies to the disease. Take African countries for example, is anyone here seriously considering that Tanzania or Niger had a better response and better health systems dealing with the disease than Belgium?
- LorenPechtel 6y ago
  The issue with Africa is demographics. Most of their high risk population is already dead.
xiphias2 6y ago
This is the first time when I'm sad that the article was flagged: excess mortality is the best metric we have for comparing countries / timelines. I like to look at https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ sometimes to get an overview instead of just looking at the overly detailed reports that are not suitable for understanding the big picture.

32 points by hhs 6y ago

A comparison should also be made between obesity rates in Europe vs the US, with the US at a strong disadvantage (because obesity has a strong correlation with higher Covid deaths). The same thing can be said about diabetes, I suspect the US had a higher percentage of persons affected by diabetes compared to Europe. IMHO diabetes is also a strong differentiator between South America and Africa in terms of deaths, I think that higher diabetes incidence in South America was partly to blame for a higher rate of Covid deaths when comparing it to Africa.

gridlockd 6y ago
Insinuating that there might something like personal responsibility affecting disease outcome is dangerous business. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBJpYIfDF3A https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBJpYIfDF3A
- paulryanrogers 6y ago
  Mere mention of a fact like obesity differences in population doesn't imply personal responsibility. US has a market, culture, and educational system that's as much to blame as individual choices.
  - gnusty_gnurc 6y ago
    Aside from even examining any of that - it's clear you have a personal bias that makes you want to impute "the US market, culture, and educational system." How convenient that a disease comes along that magically confirms all your priors about the wickedness of American institutions and culture!
    - paulryanrogers 6y ago
      Must we descend into ad hominem attacks? Let's call a spade a spade: - market manipulation [0][1] - culture [2] - education [3] 0. https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074/50-years-ago-sugar-industry-quietly-paid-scientists-to-point-blame-at-fat https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/13/493739074... 1. https://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/food https://www.apa.org/topics/kids-media/food 2. https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-sugar-increases-the-risk-of-dying-with-heart-disease-201402067021 https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/eating-too-much-added-su... 3. https://www.healthyway.com/content/how-did-the-government-get-the-food-pyramid-so-terribly-wrong/ https://www.healthyway.com/content/how-did-the-government-ge...
  - gridlockd 6y ago
    > Mere mention of a fact like obesity differences in population doesn't imply personal responsibility. If there is no personal responsibility whatsoever in obesity, then this statement is true. > US has a market, culture, and educational system that's as much to blame as individual choices. If this statement is true, then there is still some personal responsibility in obesity. Both statements can not be true at the same time. Also, culture and education doesn't absolve anyone from personal responsibility.
    - paulryanrogers 6y ago
      I'm not saying there is no personal responsibility. That's why I wrote "...as much as...". That said, a case could be made that poorly educated consumers, born to a calorie optimized tribe (say islanders), in a market flooded with industrialized food and deceptive marketing would have little hope of avoiding obesity.
gnusty_gnurc 6y ago
Vietnam has the lowest obesity rate in the world. Guess how well they've managed to avoid major damage from the virus...

gridlockd 6y ago

The problem with this comparison against "Europe" is that a lot of countries with far lower prevalence are compared against the US. Spain has a similar prevalence, but far higher mortality. UK, France, Italy have comparable mortality, but also significantly lower mortality. However you pick the numbers, there are ways to make the US look better or worse.

soco 6y ago
You are right, statistics often get a bad rep, especially when the sources and the mechanism of data slicing is not even mentioned. However, I think this article makes a very good show of what exactly they mean by "Europe" and what numbers make the US look worse. Do you mean you don't agree how they picked their numbers? Because the answer sounds like you didn't actually read the article, just making a general critique at statistics.
- gridlockd 6y ago
  It doesn't matter, because the headline is the talking point, even if the article itself is so nuanced that it puts the headline into question. I wouldn't say the article itself is bad, it shows you that the difference between EU countries is enormous (Figure 1).
tluyben2 6y ago
> Spain has a similar prevalence, but far higher mortality Which numbers[0]; spain only is a bit above (6%) in deaths and below (28%) in prevalence. Belgium is far higher in deaths; there is an actual significant difference (26%) there, but not many people live there ofcourse. Outside the UK (is that still the EU), most countries are a quite far below the US in covid mortality. [0] https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/
- gridlockd 6y ago
  That is my point, higher prevalence should lead to higher excess mortality, of course. Of all EU countries, only Spain comes close to the US in prevalence. Many countries have far lower prevalence but still comparable mortality. That tells me that when controlled for prevalence, the US actually deals far better with COVID than Europe - most likely because fewer old people got infected. Also, a lot of people died early in the pandemic, when there weren't so many tests.

deleted 6y ago

[deleted]

ceilingcorner 6y ago

Perhaps a naive question: aren’t all these evaluations based on the idea that reported deaths are accurate, globally? That seems like a pretty big flaw.

wjnc 6y ago
Yes, that is the case. Look up the Human Mortality Database and it's documentation if you're truly interested. I would say 200+ years of quite adequate data is available for some countries (perhaps undercounting things like infant mortality). My view is that Napoleon taught us well to register future and former tax payers.

glofish 6y ago

I believe these arguments based on mortality rates will, eventually, be considered "racist". And I say that with some trepidation, the label is easily thrown around today. It is almost certain that some sub-populations are more sensitive to COVID19. The causes may be genetic, environmental, cultural. Societies taking equal measures and similar socio economic backgrounds could experience vastly different outcomes for no other reason but the natural response of their bodies to the disease. Take African countries for example, is anyone here seriously considering that Tanzania or Niger had a better response and better health systems dealing with the disease than Belgium?

LorenPechtel 6y ago
The issue with Africa is demographics. Most of their high risk population is already dead.

xiphias2 6y ago

This is the first time when I'm sad that the article was flagged: excess mortality is the best metric we have for comparing countries / timelines. I like to look at https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/ sometimes to get an overview instead of just looking at the overly detailed reports that are not suitable for understanding the big picture.