11 ms·

The number of people dying is not the same as in any other year

74 points by kirkbackus 6y ago

marcell 6y ago
This really depends on how far back you look. I was looking at the data for Sweden the other day. If you look at the last 20 years in terms of overall mortality, 2020 is right around the middle: https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269941109764096 https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269941109764... It's certainly more than last year, or the year before that, but it's not an outlier for the last two decades.
- pnutjam 6y ago
  You realize the year ain't over yet.
  - marcell 6y ago
    The data is linearly adjusted to fill out the 2020 data. You are right though, that we don't have the full year's data.
    - pmiller2 6y ago
      Does it take into account that more people tend to die in December, January, and February than other months? In other words, did they adjust December properly? https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/10/more-people-die-winter-summer-14146# https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/10/more-people-die-winter-...
      - eCa 6y ago
        I agree that we can't look at the whole year until it's over, due to the irregular level of spread throughout the year. However, it's interesting to note that during the first ten weeks of 2020, 8% fewer people died in Sweden compared to the average of 2015-2019, and 2020 had in fact the lowest number of deaths of the last six years[1] during the first ten weeks of each year. [1] https://scb.se/hitta-statistik/statistik-efter-amne/befolkning/befolkningens-sammansattning/befolkningsstatistik/pong/tabell-och-diagram/preliminar-statistik-over-doda/ https://scb.se/hitta-statistik/statistik-efter-amne/befolkni... (Excel file, Tabell 5, fairly easy to translate)
        pmiller2 6y ago
        Well, that does pose a bit of a problem comparing across years, doesn't it? I'd like to see this sort of statistical analysis done after the calendar flips over to 2021, taking into account the trend of fewer deaths per year, so we could see if there is a "COVID spike" in the data, and what the magnitude of it is.
- fairity 6y ago
  If you zoom out 200 years, this year's mortality looks awesome! Yes, the world has become a safer place to live in over the years. Given the downward trend in age adjusted deaths per million over time, it makes a lot of sense to compare only the most recent years to 2020. See here to compare monthly mortality rates for every country in 2020 to the the prior 5 year period: https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid
  - marcell 6y ago
    I think looking at the last 20 years is pretty reasonable. All the years are within my lifetime. I agree we should not zoom out for the last 200 years. If the data only looks bad when you look at 5 year window, and not 20 year window, that seems like a pretty fragile argument.
    - Loughla 6y ago
      What problems have had advancements in treatment in the last 20 years? HIV/AIDS, cancer, diabetes. Those are just three things off the top of my head that I know have improved, even without data to support me. I'm not sure, with the speed of technological improvements in the last decade, that 20 years is appropriate.
      - marcell 6y ago
        Curious if you looked at the underlying data. Aside from 2018, this year does not even look like much of an outlier: https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269505984344064/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269505984344... . 2012 seems to have been deadlier, for Sweden, than 2020, which was 8 years ago.
        Spare_account 6y ago
        What about other countries?
- mcguire 6y ago
  What does "Cumulative Excess Deaths" mean and why does it spend a lot of time trending down? [Edit] And what is "Age Adjusted + Population Adjusted Deaths"? (Yes, I get "population adjusted".) [As of 2019, Sweden's population has increased 16% since 2000, 13% in the 0-17 yrs and 35% in 65+ yrs groups. The population of "Foreign Born" is up 97% (!) vs 11% growth in Swedish citizens. In that time, life expectancy has gone from 77.4 to 81.3 for men, 82.0 to 84.7 for women. "Crude death rate" has gone from 10.5 to 8.6 (per 1000). Source: https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subject-area/population/population-composition/population-statistics/pong/tables-and-graphs/yearly-statistics--the-whole-country/summary-of-population-statistics/ https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subje... As a bottom line, I'd suggest Sweden's demographics changes in the last 20 years have been crazy pants.]
  - cool_dude85 6y ago
    Conceptually, age adjustment is something like population adjustment with consideration for age or age bins. As a simple example, suppose you find that the death rate for people 0-64 is X% and 65+ is Y% in 2019. These rates change in 2020, but the proportion of the population in these age groups changes, too. So you set a baseline proportion (maybe equal to 2019), compute the per-age-group death rates in 2020, and rescale the total death rate so that the age proportions are the same as the 2019 baseline. The ultimate goal is to correct for the effects of changing age demographics in computing the death rate. You'd use it if want to look at changes that are corrected for, for example, the population as a whole aging.
- bryanlarsen 6y ago
  Looks like 10 normal months and a large spike in April and May to me.
- IvyMike 6y ago
  Sweden had pretty good numbers over the summer, but sadly have a spike of cases over the last month. Essentially half of the total covid cases in Sweden have occurred in time. So with some lag, I'd expect another jump in deaths soon, too. The twitter thread linked above is from August, so definitely does not account for these rapidly changing numbers. (Recent data is available all over the place--here's one source: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ )
- 51Cards 6y ago
  There are underlying trends in that chart that aren't evident on first glance. The latest data on that chart is from July 2020, several months ago when Sweden had their numbers under decent control. Even at that take a look at the last few columns, more particularly the slope from month to month in the last couple years. Note how from July 2019 through March 2020 the levels were at or below the previous years, however in the last few months the slope accelerates to an increasing upward monthly trend. I would be quite curious to see this chart with August, Sept, and Oct 2020 data included to see if that acceleration continued. Consider this is what Sweden's case count has looked like: https://i.imgur.com/ofUhXvK.png https://i.imgur.com/ofUhXvK.png In essence this chart is really showing only about 4 months of pandemic influence, and at a time when Sweden was doing pretty well. But in those last 4 months there is a clear accelerating trend in relation to the previous years. I won't say this was cherry picked to be misleading, but at the least it is an incomplete representation of what is happening now.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- thebruce87m 6y ago
  So many people looking at Sweden which is strange since it’s so middle of the pack. Looking at the outliers Norway, Denmark on one side and Peru and Ecuador is so much more interesting: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/07/15/tracking-covid-19-excess-deaths-across-countries https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/07/15/tracking...
belval 6y ago
The part I found interesting was the number of death from flu and pneumonia: 5 year average: 28,140 deaths 2020 so far: 18,325 deaths (does not include November and December!) COVID 2020: 53,675 deaths So while it does seem to be killing some people who would've died from the flu/pneumonia anyway, it's still nearly double the 5 year average which would make it one hell of a bad flu strain.
- jansan 6y ago
  In Germany the number of deaths from COVID-19 is below the number of people who died from influenza in 2017/2018. So far COVID-19 klilled about 13000 people, while the official numbers for influenza 2017/18 is between 20000 and 25000.
  - gabereiser 6y ago
    Because you guys in Germany took the virus seriously and put measures in place. The US went full YOLO.
    - rurban 6y ago
      Nope, that's not a good explanation. German measures we're about the same as the in Western and Southern european nations, even too late. Most others were 2 weeks earlier. The best explanation is that Germany and similar countries just have proper healthcare for seniors, esp. the retirement homes. The protected the vulnerable better. The bad countries are all united in cost cuts in those homes and healthcare. France, Belgium, UK, Spain, NL, Italy, US, Brazil. Belgium had the highest IFR due to not enough masks for caregivers. They had to share it. Spain et al also destroyed their previously excellent systems with the recent rightwing governments. Socialism is apparently the best cure for COVID-19. Even if Germany is extremely rightwing, they still have proper healthcare and caregiving infrastructure.
  - weaksauce 6y ago
    the reason is they instituted lockdowns and better leadership through crisis. flu is transmitted pretty much identically to covid so any mitigation that slows down covid by nature slows down the flu. coupled with a vaccine that is moderately effective you have a much lower incidence rate of the flu occurring and killing.
mmastrac 6y ago
And don't forget the long-term health impacts for those that survive. This will have implications for years to come.
- thdrdt 6y ago
  As with other types of viruses. Nerve damage is very common.
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > As with other types of flu. COVID-19 is not a type of the flu, in the same way that a human is not a type of bat.
    - carlob 6y ago
      Probably a better analogy would be a bat is not a type of bird.
      - jansan 6y ago
        Fun fact: The Bible counts bats as birds. Leviticus 11: 19 “And these you shall detest among the birds;a they shall not be eaten; they are detestable: the eagle, the bearded vulture, the black vulture, the kite, the falcon of any kind, every raven of any kind, the ostrich, the nighthawk, the sea gull, the hawk of any kind, the little owl, the cormorant, the short-eared owl, the barn owl, the tawny owl, the carrion vulture, the stork, the heron of any kind, the hoopoe, and the bat."
        yread 6y ago
        Interesting, I never knew ostrich or heron were "haram". Herons used to be a famous delicacy in mediaval Europe. https://survlivel.cultu.be/heron-stew https://survlivel.cultu.be/heron-stew And ostriches are moderately popular now
    - gabereiser 6y ago
CogentHedgehog 6y ago
Key point: > The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show the number of deaths registered in England and Wales in the week ending 6 November 2020 was 14.3% higher than the five-year average. But it is good to know that the measures to control COVID-19 are also suppressing flu and pneumonia (though not enough to make up for COVID-19 mortality).
- lvass 6y ago
  A whole week of data!?
  - renewiltord 6y ago
    Oh god just click through, dude. Why are so many hn commenters obsessed with these banalities https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/latest https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsde... I should warn you that you might have to scroll a little, lest you find yourself writing a comment in response before you read section 2.
    - CogentHedgehog 6y ago
      Yup, the data is right there. HN commenters just want to "but aktsualllly..." The spike in deaths from the UK's first wave is pretty visible in the graphs, and the spike from cases we're seeing now will probably take a few weeks to show up in the data.
- dmichulke 6y ago
  Also, they didn't write the standard deviation, so that 14% is kind of useless
  - himinlomax 6y ago
    Over a stable population of 10s of millions of people, it's unlikely to be notable.
just-juan-post 6y ago
CDC's numbers as of today, scroll down to the "Weekly number of deaths (from all causes)" section https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm
samatman 6y ago
The interesting question, to me, is whether we will see a visible spike in all-cause mortality for, let's say, 2020-2025. COVID-19 is particularly hard on the elderly, which is by no means an inevitable fact about epidemics. Every person who dies of this disease would have lived longer, which makes their death a tragedy: but how much longer? Cards on the table: my suspicion is that we won't. I could be wrong, particularly if recovering from the disease shortens lifespans for an appreciable number of patients. We'll know when we know.
- x87678r 6y ago
  Add to that the health complications of missed cancer scans, "quarantine 15" weight gain, economic turmoil, lost education, drug addiction and mental health. I'm guessing middle aged people's death rates will be increasing the next few years with cancer, heart disease and suicides all increasing.
  - thebruce87m 6y ago
    If you look at data for my country (Scotland) it the 45 - 64 age group have occupied the most hospital beds during the pandemic. https://www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker/ https://www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker... Scroll to “Hospital Admissions by Age Group” So while some scans etc will have been missed for this age group during lockdown, they would also have suffered losses as a result of an overwhelmed health system.
- mcguire 6y ago
  February through July, an average of 9.3 years of life lost. https://academic.oup.com/jpubhealth/advance-article/doi/10.1093/pubmed/fdaa159/5901977 https://academic.oup.com/jpubhealth/advance-article/doi/10.1... "Deaths among adults 65 and older accounted for 80% of excess YLL in April but only 36% of excess YLL in June. Since April, working age adults 20-64 have accounted for 47% of excess YLL, and males 20 to 64 have contributed 34%." https://healthcostinstitute.org/hcci-research/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-years-of-life-lost https://healthcostinstitute.org/hcci-research/the-impact-of-...
- 6y ago
gazillionaire 6y ago
Maddening that they don't manage to present clear data points - deliberately, or because they don't know any better? Like what is the point of comparing flu deaths between January and August with Covif219 deaths in the same time period? Perhaps those two diseases have different seasons? (Maybe not, but they way they present it, it is impossible to know). Perhaps all the flu deaths happen in December and all the Corona deaths in March? (Just an example). Also for example Sweden had exceptionally few deaths last years, leaving exceptionally many people "ripe to die" this year (what Marginal Revolution calls the "Dry Cinder Effect"). Also comparing to averages can also be very misleading. It is in fact to be expected that any given year deviates from the average. It would be very odd if every year was exactly on the average. Then in the middle of comparing death rates of previous years, they seem to jump to absolute counting of Covid19 deaths again ("The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show"). When the whole point of looking a death rates of previous years is to establish how many excess deaths were really attributable to Covid19.
- marstall 6y ago
  exactly. to boot, if you look at death rates for all of the UK, they have been on an upward trend for the past several years so it is no surprise that deaths would higher this year than in any year in the past five years https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/death-rate https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/dea...
  - mcguire 6y ago
    UK death rate, 2015: 9.179 / 1000; 2020: 9.413. Calculated total deaths, 2015 (pop. 64.85 million): 595,258.15; 2020 (pop. 67.89 million): 639,048.57. Difference: 43,790.42. Weekly averages: 11,000 - 12,000. See Figure 1, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/923240/Weekly_all-cause_mortality_surveillane_week_40_2020_report.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... for a chart of England's excess mortality. "In week 16 2020, an estimated 22,351 all-cause deaths were registered in England and Wales (source: Office for National Statistics). This is an increase compared to the 18,516 estimated death registrations in week 152020. ... In the devolved administrations,no statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed for Northern Ireland or Wales in week 17. Statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed for Scotland in week 15." (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/882399/Weekly_all_cause_mortality_surveillance_week_18_2020_report.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...) It looks like the peak occurred in week 17, with 22,351 deaths.
deleted 6y ago
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lvass 6y ago
This year has brought major lifestyle changes to a lot of people. Can you tell how much this affects mortality?
anewguy9000 6y ago
what these numbers and the media and your average joe terrified of dying seem to miss is something thats qualitative, not quantitative: quality of life. length of life could be enhanced for many, safe and securely shackled to a bed in a quasi-coma with a feeding tube down your throat. such a person may very well ask to die. it pains me to see ederly and terminally ill people saying goodbye to loved ones on zoom connections. to me, that is a crime against humanity, in the name of safety and security. there are others. we are in a difficult place, to be sure, but how we live matters. but nobody talks about this very basic concept without fear of being labelled a "covidiot".
- anewerguy001 6y ago
  I think it's very hard to see people dying and suffereing (often) alone. But I'm not sure what the solution to that is...do we open the Covid units up to visitors and ignore the consequence to spread from doing that? Unfortunately, the politicization has turned this issue into a binary decision with bad outcomes on both ends. I think there is a place for people to engage in a more "normal" life even in the context of the pandemic...but it's hard to define that space in 2020. Also, in my view, the covidiots aren't the people that wish they could be with their sick or dying relatives/friends. Those are the people that absolutely refuse (as a matter of principle) to do the bare minimum to help contain this...or worse, the people who pack clubs, parties, etc fantasizing that his pandemic doesn't really exist.
- fpgaminer 6y ago
  If _everyone_ wore masks and followed very basic guidelines, the virus would be dead in the water and we could go about living mostly normal lives. People could visit their loved ones, say goodbye to the terminally ill, work, have outdoor dining, see drive in movies. Scarce little impact on quality of life. Instead vast swathes of the U.S. and other countries flout even the most basic precautions making it impossible for the rest of us to live normal lives. The argument that being safe == poor quality of life presents a false dichotomy. The truth is that we can be safe _and_ have the same quality of life. Instead many have chosen the third option: they believe that their "right" to shop at Walmart without an extra piece of clothing is more important than people being able to say goodbye to loved ones; more important than their neighbor's wellbeing; more important than the economy. I would further argue that not only would quality of life not suffer if everyone took basic precautions, in many ways QoL would be _better_. As the statistics are showing we've seen a massive dropoff in cold/flu related deaths, even with poorly implemented COVID protections. Less auto accidents and less pollution. A rise in work from home. The list goes on. Contrary to the doom and gloom of this year, COVID was really a chance to build a better world. We might just yet do it in small ways. But much of the potential good is being squandered, as it always is, by selfish, ignorant, hateful people.
mamon 6y ago
The worst thing is: healthcare in my country is so focused on some bogus COVID "pandemic" that it starts to neglect other branches of medicine. Yes, there will be more deaths this year than average, but those people won't die from coronavirus, they will die from untreated cancer, cardiovascular disease, etc.
rurban 6y ago
Might be true, and likely is for England, but not for Wales. The data presented on this website doesn't show the flu death curves for 2017 - 2020, only the spike of this year. And you cannot compare a spike with a 5 year average. You either compare the absolute numbers or the curves. Here are some proper curves where you can see the UK (England) problem: https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/#z-scores-by-country https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/#z-scores-by-country And compare to other countries with a similar failing nursing system, to the ones with a proper one.
kylewins 6y ago
Hopefully they can redo this article with more countries stats, I would love to know USA, China, India, etc
destitude 6y ago
They keep referencing 5 year average instead of what the maximum deaths were in any of the past 5 years. There were some flu death years that were pretty bad but never got any attention so wonder if that is why they don't mention how it compares to one of the maximums.
- beagle3 6y ago
  .. or standard deviation, for that matter.
deleted 6y ago
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74 points by kirkbackus 6y ago

This really depends on how far back you look. I was looking at the data for Sweden the other day. If you look at the last 20 years in terms of overall mortality, 2020 is right around the middle: https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269941109764096 https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269941109764... It's certainly more than last year, or the year before that, but it's not an outlier for the last two decades.

pnutjam 6y ago
You realize the year ain't over yet.
- marcell 6y ago
  The data is linearly adjusted to fill out the 2020 data. You are right though, that we don't have the full year's data.
  - pmiller2 6y ago
    Does it take into account that more people tend to die in December, January, and February than other months? In other words, did they adjust December properly? https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/10/more-people-die-winter-summer-14146# https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/10/more-people-die-winter-...
    - eCa 6y ago
      I agree that we can't look at the whole year until it's over, due to the irregular level of spread throughout the year. However, it's interesting to note that during the first ten weeks of 2020, 8% fewer people died in Sweden compared to the average of 2015-2019, and 2020 had in fact the lowest number of deaths of the last six years[1] during the first ten weeks of each year. [1] https://scb.se/hitta-statistik/statistik-efter-amne/befolkning/befolkningens-sammansattning/befolkningsstatistik/pong/tabell-och-diagram/preliminar-statistik-over-doda/ https://scb.se/hitta-statistik/statistik-efter-amne/befolkni... (Excel file, Tabell 5, fairly easy to translate)
      - pmiller2 6y ago
        Well, that does pose a bit of a problem comparing across years, doesn't it? I'd like to see this sort of statistical analysis done after the calendar flips over to 2021, taking into account the trend of fewer deaths per year, so we could see if there is a "COVID spike" in the data, and what the magnitude of it is.
fairity 6y ago
If you zoom out 200 years, this year's mortality looks awesome! Yes, the world has become a safer place to live in over the years. Given the downward trend in age adjusted deaths per million over time, it makes a lot of sense to compare only the most recent years to 2020. See here to compare monthly mortality rates for every country in 2020 to the the prior 5 year period: https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid https://ourworldindata.org/excess-mortality-covid
- marcell 6y ago
  I think looking at the last 20 years is pretty reasonable. All the years are within my lifetime. I agree we should not zoom out for the last 200 years. If the data only looks bad when you look at 5 year window, and not 20 year window, that seems like a pretty fragile argument.
  - Loughla 6y ago
    What problems have had advancements in treatment in the last 20 years? HIV/AIDS, cancer, diabetes. Those are just three things off the top of my head that I know have improved, even without data to support me. I'm not sure, with the speed of technological improvements in the last decade, that 20 years is appropriate.
    - marcell 6y ago
      Curious if you looked at the underlying data. Aside from 2018, this year does not even look like much of an outlier: https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269505984344064/photo/1 https://mobile.twitter.com/TLennhamn/status/1295269505984344... . 2012 seems to have been deadlier, for Sweden, than 2020, which was 8 years ago.
      - Spare_account 6y ago
        What about other countries?
mcguire 6y ago
What does "Cumulative Excess Deaths" mean and why does it spend a lot of time trending down? [Edit] And what is "Age Adjusted + Population Adjusted Deaths"? (Yes, I get "population adjusted".) [As of 2019, Sweden's population has increased 16% since 2000, 13% in the 0-17 yrs and 35% in 65+ yrs groups. The population of "Foreign Born" is up 97% (!) vs 11% growth in Swedish citizens. In that time, life expectancy has gone from 77.4 to 81.3 for men, 82.0 to 84.7 for women. "Crude death rate" has gone from 10.5 to 8.6 (per 1000). Source: https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subject-area/population/population-composition/population-statistics/pong/tables-and-graphs/yearly-statistics--the-whole-country/summary-of-population-statistics/ https://www.scb.se/en/finding-statistics/statistics-by-subje... As a bottom line, I'd suggest Sweden's demographics changes in the last 20 years have been crazy pants.]
- cool_dude85 6y ago
  Conceptually, age adjustment is something like population adjustment with consideration for age or age bins. As a simple example, suppose you find that the death rate for people 0-64 is X% and 65+ is Y% in 2019. These rates change in 2020, but the proportion of the population in these age groups changes, too. So you set a baseline proportion (maybe equal to 2019), compute the per-age-group death rates in 2020, and rescale the total death rate so that the age proportions are the same as the 2019 baseline. The ultimate goal is to correct for the effects of changing age demographics in computing the death rate. You'd use it if want to look at changes that are corrected for, for example, the population as a whole aging.
bryanlarsen 6y ago
Looks like 10 normal months and a large spike in April and May to me.
IvyMike 6y ago
Sweden had pretty good numbers over the summer, but sadly have a spike of cases over the last month. Essentially half of the total covid cases in Sweden have occurred in time. So with some lag, I'd expect another jump in deaths soon, too. The twitter thread linked above is from August, so definitely does not account for these rapidly changing numbers. (Recent data is available all over the place--here's one source: https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/country/sweden/ )
51Cards 6y ago
There are underlying trends in that chart that aren't evident on first glance. The latest data on that chart is from July 2020, several months ago when Sweden had their numbers under decent control. Even at that take a look at the last few columns, more particularly the slope from month to month in the last couple years. Note how from July 2019 through March 2020 the levels were at or below the previous years, however in the last few months the slope accelerates to an increasing upward monthly trend. I would be quite curious to see this chart with August, Sept, and Oct 2020 data included to see if that acceleration continued. Consider this is what Sweden's case count has looked like: https://i.imgur.com/ofUhXvK.png https://i.imgur.com/ofUhXvK.png In essence this chart is really showing only about 4 months of pandemic influence, and at a time when Sweden was doing pretty well. But in those last 4 months there is a clear accelerating trend in relation to the previous years. I won't say this was cherry picked to be misleading, but at the least it is an incomplete representation of what is happening now.
deleted 6y ago
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thebruce87m 6y ago
So many people looking at Sweden which is strange since it’s so middle of the pack. Looking at the outliers Norway, Denmark on one side and Peru and Ecuador is so much more interesting: https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/07/15/tracking-covid-19-excess-deaths-across-countries https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2020/07/15/tracking...

belval 6y ago

The part I found interesting was the number of death from flu and pneumonia: 5 year average: 28,140 deaths 2020 so far: 18,325 deaths (does not include November and December!) COVID 2020: 53,675 deaths So while it does seem to be killing some people who would've died from the flu/pneumonia anyway, it's still nearly double the 5 year average which would make it one hell of a bad flu strain.

jansan 6y ago
In Germany the number of deaths from COVID-19 is below the number of people who died from influenza in 2017/2018. So far COVID-19 klilled about 13000 people, while the official numbers for influenza 2017/18 is between 20000 and 25000.
- gabereiser 6y ago
  Because you guys in Germany took the virus seriously and put measures in place. The US went full YOLO.
  - rurban 6y ago
    Nope, that's not a good explanation. German measures we're about the same as the in Western and Southern european nations, even too late. Most others were 2 weeks earlier. The best explanation is that Germany and similar countries just have proper healthcare for seniors, esp. the retirement homes. The protected the vulnerable better. The bad countries are all united in cost cuts in those homes and healthcare. France, Belgium, UK, Spain, NL, Italy, US, Brazil. Belgium had the highest IFR due to not enough masks for caregivers. They had to share it. Spain et al also destroyed their previously excellent systems with the recent rightwing governments. Socialism is apparently the best cure for COVID-19. Even if Germany is extremely rightwing, they still have proper healthcare and caregiving infrastructure.
- weaksauce 6y ago
  the reason is they instituted lockdowns and better leadership through crisis. flu is transmitted pretty much identically to covid so any mitigation that slows down covid by nature slows down the flu. coupled with a vaccine that is moderately effective you have a much lower incidence rate of the flu occurring and killing.

mmastrac 6y ago

And don't forget the long-term health impacts for those that survive. This will have implications for years to come.

thdrdt 6y ago
As with other types of viruses. Nerve damage is very common.
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > As with other types of flu. COVID-19 is not a type of the flu, in the same way that a human is not a type of bat.
  - carlob 6y ago
    Probably a better analogy would be a bat is not a type of bird.
    - jansan 6y ago
      Fun fact: The Bible counts bats as birds. Leviticus 11: 19 “And these you shall detest among the birds;a they shall not be eaten; they are detestable: the eagle, the bearded vulture, the black vulture, the kite, the falcon of any kind, every raven of any kind, the ostrich, the nighthawk, the sea gull, the hawk of any kind, the little owl, the cormorant, the short-eared owl, the barn owl, the tawny owl, the carrion vulture, the stork, the heron of any kind, the hoopoe, and the bat."
      - yread 6y ago
        Interesting, I never knew ostrich or heron were "haram". Herons used to be a famous delicacy in mediaval Europe. https://survlivel.cultu.be/heron-stew https://survlivel.cultu.be/heron-stew And ostriches are moderately popular now
  - gabereiser 6y ago

CogentHedgehog 6y ago

Key point: > The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show the number of deaths registered in England and Wales in the week ending 6 November 2020 was 14.3% higher than the five-year average. But it is good to know that the measures to control COVID-19 are also suppressing flu and pneumonia (though not enough to make up for COVID-19 mortality).

lvass 6y ago
A whole week of data!?
- renewiltord 6y ago
  Oh god just click through, dude. Why are so many hn commenters obsessed with these banalities https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsdeathsandmarriages/deaths/bulletins/deathsregisteredweeklyinenglandandwalesprovisional/latest https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/birthsde... I should warn you that you might have to scroll a little, lest you find yourself writing a comment in response before you read section 2.
  - CogentHedgehog 6y ago
    Yup, the data is right there. HN commenters just want to "but aktsualllly..." The spike in deaths from the UK's first wave is pretty visible in the graphs, and the spike from cases we're seeing now will probably take a few weeks to show up in the data.
dmichulke 6y ago
Also, they didn't write the standard deviation, so that 14% is kind of useless
- himinlomax 6y ago
  Over a stable population of 10s of millions of people, it's unlikely to be notable.

just-juan-post 6y ago

CDC's numbers as of today, scroll down to the "Weekly number of deaths (from all causes)" section https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm https://www.cdc.gov/nchs/nvss/vsrr/covid19/excess_deaths.htm

samatman 6y ago

The interesting question, to me, is whether we will see a visible spike in all-cause mortality for, let's say, 2020-2025. COVID-19 is particularly hard on the elderly, which is by no means an inevitable fact about epidemics. Every person who dies of this disease would have lived longer, which makes their death a tragedy: but how much longer? Cards on the table: my suspicion is that we won't. I could be wrong, particularly if recovering from the disease shortens lifespans for an appreciable number of patients. We'll know when we know.

x87678r 6y ago
Add to that the health complications of missed cancer scans, "quarantine 15" weight gain, economic turmoil, lost education, drug addiction and mental health. I'm guessing middle aged people's death rates will be increasing the next few years with cancer, heart disease and suicides all increasing.
- thebruce87m 6y ago
  If you look at data for my country (Scotland) it the 45 - 64 age group have occupied the most hospital beds during the pandemic. https://www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker/ https://www.travellingtabby.com/scotland-coronavirus-tracker... Scroll to “Hospital Admissions by Age Group” So while some scans etc will have been missed for this age group during lockdown, they would also have suffered losses as a result of an overwhelmed health system.
mcguire 6y ago
February through July, an average of 9.3 years of life lost. https://academic.oup.com/jpubhealth/advance-article/doi/10.1093/pubmed/fdaa159/5901977 https://academic.oup.com/jpubhealth/advance-article/doi/10.1... "Deaths among adults 65 and older accounted for 80% of excess YLL in April but only 36% of excess YLL in June. Since April, working age adults 20-64 have accounted for 47% of excess YLL, and males 20 to 64 have contributed 34%." https://healthcostinstitute.org/hcci-research/the-impact-of-covid-19-on-years-of-life-lost https://healthcostinstitute.org/hcci-research/the-impact-of-...
6y ago

gazillionaire 6y ago

Maddening that they don't manage to present clear data points - deliberately, or because they don't know any better? Like what is the point of comparing flu deaths between January and August with Covif219 deaths in the same time period? Perhaps those two diseases have different seasons? (Maybe not, but they way they present it, it is impossible to know). Perhaps all the flu deaths happen in December and all the Corona deaths in March? (Just an example). Also for example Sweden had exceptionally few deaths last years, leaving exceptionally many people "ripe to die" this year (what Marginal Revolution calls the "Dry Cinder Effect"). Also comparing to averages can also be very misleading. It is in fact to be expected that any given year deviates from the average. It would be very odd if every year was exactly on the average. Then in the middle of comparing death rates of previous years, they seem to jump to absolute counting of Covid19 deaths again ("The latest figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) show"). When the whole point of looking a death rates of previous years is to establish how many excess deaths were really attributable to Covid19.

marstall 6y ago
exactly. to boot, if you look at death rates for all of the UK, they have been on an upward trend for the past several years so it is no surprise that deaths would higher this year than in any year in the past five years https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/death-rate https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/GBR/united-kingdom/dea...
- mcguire 6y ago
  UK death rate, 2015: 9.179 / 1000; 2020: 9.413. Calculated total deaths, 2015 (pop. 64.85 million): 595,258.15; 2020 (pop. 67.89 million): 639,048.57. Difference: 43,790.42. Weekly averages: 11,000 - 12,000. See Figure 1, https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/923240/Weekly_all-cause_mortality_surveillane_week_40_2020_report.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/... for a chart of England's excess mortality. "In week 16 2020, an estimated 22,351 all-cause deaths were registered in England and Wales (source: Office for National Statistics). This is an increase compared to the 18,516 estimated death registrations in week 152020. ... In the devolved administrations,no statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed for Northern Ireland or Wales in week 17. Statistically significant excess all-cause mortality for all ages was observed for Scotland in week 15." (https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/882399/Weekly_all_cause_mortality_surveillance_week_18_2020_report.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...) It looks like the peak occurred in week 17, with 22,351 deaths.

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lvass 6y ago

This year has brought major lifestyle changes to a lot of people. Can you tell how much this affects mortality?

anewguy9000 6y ago

what these numbers and the media and your average joe terrified of dying seem to miss is something thats qualitative, not quantitative: quality of life. length of life could be enhanced for many, safe and securely shackled to a bed in a quasi-coma with a feeding tube down your throat. such a person may very well ask to die. it pains me to see ederly and terminally ill people saying goodbye to loved ones on zoom connections. to me, that is a crime against humanity, in the name of safety and security. there are others. we are in a difficult place, to be sure, but how we live matters. but nobody talks about this very basic concept without fear of being labelled a "covidiot".

anewerguy001 6y ago
I think it's very hard to see people dying and suffereing (often) alone. But I'm not sure what the solution to that is...do we open the Covid units up to visitors and ignore the consequence to spread from doing that? Unfortunately, the politicization has turned this issue into a binary decision with bad outcomes on both ends. I think there is a place for people to engage in a more "normal" life even in the context of the pandemic...but it's hard to define that space in 2020. Also, in my view, the covidiots aren't the people that wish they could be with their sick or dying relatives/friends. Those are the people that absolutely refuse (as a matter of principle) to do the bare minimum to help contain this...or worse, the people who pack clubs, parties, etc fantasizing that his pandemic doesn't really exist.
fpgaminer 6y ago
If _everyone_ wore masks and followed very basic guidelines, the virus would be dead in the water and we could go about living mostly normal lives. People could visit their loved ones, say goodbye to the terminally ill, work, have outdoor dining, see drive in movies. Scarce little impact on quality of life. Instead vast swathes of the U.S. and other countries flout even the most basic precautions making it impossible for the rest of us to live normal lives. The argument that being safe == poor quality of life presents a false dichotomy. The truth is that we can be safe _and_ have the same quality of life. Instead many have chosen the third option: they believe that their "right" to shop at Walmart without an extra piece of clothing is more important than people being able to say goodbye to loved ones; more important than their neighbor's wellbeing; more important than the economy. I would further argue that not only would quality of life not suffer if everyone took basic precautions, in many ways QoL would be _better_. As the statistics are showing we've seen a massive dropoff in cold/flu related deaths, even with poorly implemented COVID protections. Less auto accidents and less pollution. A rise in work from home. The list goes on. Contrary to the doom and gloom of this year, COVID was really a chance to build a better world. We might just yet do it in small ways. But much of the potential good is being squandered, as it always is, by selfish, ignorant, hateful people.

mamon 6y ago

The worst thing is: healthcare in my country is so focused on some bogus COVID "pandemic" that it starts to neglect other branches of medicine. Yes, there will be more deaths this year than average, but those people won't die from coronavirus, they will die from untreated cancer, cardiovascular disease, etc.

rurban 6y ago

Might be true, and likely is for England, but not for Wales. The data presented on this website doesn't show the flu death curves for 2017 - 2020, only the spike of this year. And you cannot compare a spike with a 5 year average. You either compare the absolute numbers or the curves. Here are some proper curves where you can see the UK (England) problem: https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/#z-scores-by-country https://www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/#z-scores-by-country And compare to other countries with a similar failing nursing system, to the ones with a proper one.

kylewins 6y ago

Hopefully they can redo this article with more countries stats, I would love to know USA, China, India, etc

destitude 6y ago

They keep referencing 5 year average instead of what the maximum deaths were in any of the past 5 years. There were some flu death years that were pretty bad but never got any attention so wonder if that is why they don't mention how it compares to one of the maximums.

beagle3 6y ago
.. or standard deviation, for that matter.

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