5 ms·

If I read those graphs correctly, except during the peak of each waves, the death rates seems very similar to other years? ie, people dying of covid are people

If I read those graphs correctly, except during the peak of each waves, the death rates seems very similar to other years? ie, people dying of covid are people that would have died anyways from other causes.

lesdeuxmagots 6y ago
Not quite. The relatively similar all cause does not imply that it would be the same people dying. There could instead people different people dying. For example, there are much less people dying by automobile accidents (a leading cause of death for young people). In 2020, they could be replaced by very different types of death (COVID, Suicide, etc.) That said, it certainly COULD be relatively similar people. You’d likely see relatively similar individuals dying of pneumonia as dying from COVID.
Barrin92 6y ago
>ie, people dying of covid are people that would have died anyways from other causes. yes, with some exceptions (Spain, the UK, the US seem to register an actual significant spike in deaths). But overall it's true that the age of the average covid death is as high, or in some countries even higher than the average lifespan, meaning it's likely the person would have died of some other cause. I've always thought that not comparing deaths, but comparing 'number of high quality life years' lost or something similar would make more sense, even if it is somewhat more abstract.
- beagle3 6y ago
  The term you are looking for a is QALYs - quality adjusted life years. It is a metric already used to e.g. rank public spending on expensive drugs and treatments.
wegs 6y ago
I don't think so. If people live 100 years, you have 1% of the population die each year. In the US, COVID has killed a quarter-million, which is just under 0.1%, so an increase of under 10%. You'll barely see a 10% increase on a noisy chart. In practice, that's a 50% increase some months, and a 1% increase others. So it looks underwhelming. But it isn't the same people. But it's definitely not just people who would have died anyway. We're also at just under 1 in 30 people infected. If everyone caught COVID, you'd naively see 30x as many deaths, or 7.5 million dead. Practically, not everyone would catch COVID, and by demographics, I suspect fewer would die, so we'd be talking maybe 2-3 million excess deaths if we let it burn. And probably another few million with long-term disability.
- oceanplexian 6y ago
  When you look at the numbers in terms of what % of lives the COVID response have saved in the entire population, it raises some serious questions. In the USA, economists claim the pandemic will cost approximately $16T. If you assume the unmitigated death toll would have been 2.2M absent any restrictions, subtracting the 200k that have died (So 16T/2M), theoretically we paid approximately $8 million dollars per life saved. Obviously even one life lost is too much, but one has to wonder if that stimulus and productivity loss could have saved more lives if invested somewhere else, such as healthcare, cancer research or motor vehicle safety.
  - davrosthedalek 6y ago
    This assumes, quite wrongly I think, that the cost of the pandemic would have been 0 without any restriction. Indeed, Sweden shows us that this is not true, because they also saw substantial economic damage. I certainly wouldn't go to a restaurant right now, even if I would be allowed to. Would you? In fact, if we would have indeed 10 times the death rate, the impact on the economy could very well be larger.

lesdeuxmagots 6y ago

Not quite. The relatively similar all cause does not imply that it would be the same people dying. There could instead people different people dying. For example, there are much less people dying by automobile accidents (a leading cause of death for young people). In 2020, they could be replaced by very different types of death (COVID, Suicide, etc.) That said, it certainly COULD be relatively similar people. You’d likely see relatively similar individuals dying of pneumonia as dying from COVID.

Barrin92 6y ago

>ie, people dying of covid are people that would have died anyways from other causes. yes, with some exceptions (Spain, the UK, the US seem to register an actual significant spike in deaths). But overall it's true that the age of the average covid death is as high, or in some countries even higher than the average lifespan, meaning it's likely the person would have died of some other cause. I've always thought that not comparing deaths, but comparing 'number of high quality life years' lost or something similar would make more sense, even if it is somewhat more abstract.

beagle3 6y ago
The term you are looking for a is QALYs - quality adjusted life years. It is a metric already used to e.g. rank public spending on expensive drugs and treatments.

wegs 6y ago

I don't think so. If people live 100 years, you have 1% of the population die each year. In the US, COVID has killed a quarter-million, which is just under 0.1%, so an increase of under 10%. You'll barely see a 10% increase on a noisy chart. In practice, that's a 50% increase some months, and a 1% increase others. So it looks underwhelming. But it isn't the same people. But it's definitely not just people who would have died anyway. We're also at just under 1 in 30 people infected. If everyone caught COVID, you'd naively see 30x as many deaths, or 7.5 million dead. Practically, not everyone would catch COVID, and by demographics, I suspect fewer would die, so we'd be talking maybe 2-3 million excess deaths if we let it burn. And probably another few million with long-term disability.

oceanplexian 6y ago
When you look at the numbers in terms of what % of lives the COVID response have saved in the entire population, it raises some serious questions. In the USA, economists claim the pandemic will cost approximately $16T. If you assume the unmitigated death toll would have been 2.2M absent any restrictions, subtracting the 200k that have died (So 16T/2M), theoretically we paid approximately $8 million dollars per life saved. Obviously even one life lost is too much, but one has to wonder if that stimulus and productivity loss could have saved more lives if invested somewhere else, such as healthcare, cancer research or motor vehicle safety.
- davrosthedalek 6y ago
  This assumes, quite wrongly I think, that the cost of the pandemic would have been 0 without any restriction. Indeed, Sweden shows us that this is not true, because they also saw substantial economic damage. I certainly wouldn't go to a restaurant right now, even if I would be allowed to. Would you? In fact, if we would have indeed 10 times the death rate, the impact on the economy could very well be larger.