They then say that they considered all the 3 factors that lead to increases to be COVID deaths: > The main potential increases in excess mortality due to defer

They then say that they considered all the 3 factors that lead to increases to be COVID deaths: > The main potential increases in excess mortality due to deferred care and increases in drug overdose and depression are hard to quantify at this point or are of a much smaller magnitude. Given that there is insufficient evidence to estimate these contributions to excess mortality, for now we assume that total COVID-19 deaths equal excess mortality Basically the 6 factor breakdown is a way to decrease the volume of expected deaths to make the excess mortality number larger. 100% of which was attributed to COVID.