5 ms·

I feel like one perceptual problem with this polar plot is that the area under the excess deaths is misleadingly large - - it feels like the proportion of exces

by dahart 5y ago

I feel like one perceptual problem with this polar plot is that the area under the excess deaths is misleadingly large - - it feels like the proportion of excess deaths is much larger than it really is, because the area between the 2020/21 line and 2018/19 line is almost as much area as under the 2018/19 line, even though the average ratio is (eyeballing) more like 20%. > Using this kind of graph one can more easily see how changes year-to-year in total observed deaths have been affected by COVID-19. It’s important to look at and account for the number of deaths directly attributed to COVID, isn’t it? Is there some discrepancy between the excess YoY deaths implied here and the number directly attributed to COVID? Also would be good to normalize per-capita, just to fully factor out population growth? > Using total observed deaths, one can disregard the (mis)attribution of deaths to COVID-19 and more clearly see the failure of federal and state governments. Out of curiosity, what are the misattributions and failures being referred to? Just confused a little since the source data is federal (CDC) and has this exact same graph showing the excess death rate this year, just on a horizontal plot.

antattack 5y ago
> It’s important to look at and account for the number of deaths directly attributed to COVID, isn’t it? Is there some discrepancy between the excess YoY deaths implied here and the number directly attributed to COVID? Also would be good to normalize per-capita, just to fully factor out population growth? If that's important to you than just use Cartesian graph. Polar graph shows better seasonal patterns as it does not cut abruptly at the end of the each year.
nixpulvis 5y ago
I was thinking about that while reading these plots too. But I also wonder if readers will understand the slopes.
icegreentea2 5y ago
Misattributions could be referring to two possible things: A) Uncertainty about how deaths are effectively false positives, and how many "deaths due to COVID" weren't counted. This is a combination of plain uncertainty, not having testing available for everything, all the way up to people fudging numbers (perhaps by choosing not to test categories of deaths). B) It's unclear (as in people will argue, on both sides) if "deaths with COVID" vs "deaths due to COVID (with some definition of 'due')" is the right measure. The failures is just shit talking (shit talk can be both deserved and undeserved) the government responses. The basis of the shit talking is that the red and green lines should be far closer to the previous baselines.
- mcculley 5y ago
  Author here. Yes, I mean both kinds of misattributions. We don't have thorough enough testing to use case numbers or what is written on a death certificate. Just using excess deaths, it is much clearer to me. As for shit talking, I have been frustrated since March of 2020 at the impotence and incompetence of our culture and government to respond and I'm tired of arguing with Trump and Biden apologists. I could probably word all of that better.
heisenzombie 5y ago
> the area under the excess deaths is misleadingly large Yes, it's always a trade-off of course, but I generally prefer to sqrt() the radial axis of this kind of plot so it is equal-area.
- mcculley 5y ago
  Author here. That is a good idea. I will try that.
  - mcculley 5y ago
    I have regenerated the graphs to use the square root of the count as the radius to keep the area constant, as others have suggested. I appreciate the feedback.
    - heisenzombie 5y ago
      Hey, nice one — I’m glad I could give a useful suggestion… Unfortunately it doesn’t make the numbers less tragic.
- bmsleight_ 5y ago
  Curious how this works, trying to do the maths in my head, but polar integration not my strong subject.
  - Gravityloss 5y ago
    Area of a slice is angle/2 x r^2. Whole circle (angle = 2 x pi) is pi x r^2
mcculley 5y ago
Author here: I originally started doing this for my state, Florida. I wanted to show what our normal cycle of deaths looks like. We generally have the most deaths during the dry, cold weeks of at the end of January and the beginning of February. We generally have the fewest deaths during August, when it is hottest and most humid. There was a lot of discussion around how many more deaths were caused by COVID versus normal expected causes. I wanted to make that clearer. You make a good point about the area being misleadingly large. I had not thought of that. As for population growth, I thought about that but I'm not sure where to get reliable numbers for each region. As is, one can see that in 2017-2019, the curves were showing steady growth as expected to correlate with population.
Thorrez 5y ago
>It’s important to look at and account for the number of deaths directly attributed to COVID, isn’t it? Some people don't trust that data. I've heard people tell me that when COVID started the hospitals started marking everyone who died as having COVID regardless of what the real cause was. >Shared hundreds of times on Facebook, posts claim: “Every time a hospital admits, discharges, or loses a patient to Covid-19, they are compensated 15% more according to the CARES ACT, SEC 4409”. The posts also say that New York City hospitals are “inflating all of their #coronavirus numbers” to take advantage of this section of the act. https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-more-money-for-covid-cases-idUSKBN22I2KR https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-more-money-for-...
- zaarn 5y ago
  I've heard that often enough from a family member, often condensed into "they didn't die of COVID, they died with COVID" (which let to the obvious shot back later that year from me being "they didn't die of the vaccine, they died with the vaccine"). There is obvious borderline cases when COVID merely accelerated another disease (heart failure), but I bet in 99% of cases, the ultimate cause of death is one or multiple organ failure due to COVID.
  - hamburglar 5y ago
    The thing these graphs show (and I agree with the criticism that plotting it in polar makes the excess volume look much larger) is that you can completely ignore why anyone died and still see a very clear pattern that 2020 stands out as very different than previous years, and the plot of the delta between 2020 and those other years exactly matches the numbers that CDC attributes to COVID-19. In other words, even if you question their categorization of deaths, it’s impossible to deny that something out of the ordinary caused 600k excess deaths in the US, and that “something” happened to coincide perfectly with the COVID-19 surges.
- bellyfullofbac 5y ago
  The important bit is the number of excess deaths, which is higher than previous 5 years' averages. To draw a parellel, if someone started getting more tips at the restaurn they worked at, or more Tinder matches than usual, they should notice "Hey, something's changed..." and wonder what the reason behind it is..
heliodor 5y ago
What would remove the distortion would be a 3D plot on the surface of a cylinder. However, connecting the end of one year to the start of the next is not what's important. Having a undistorted line graph that plots each year would be much more informative.
mcculley 5y ago
Author here. I have regenerated the graphs to use the square root of the count as the radius to keep the area constant, as others have suggested. I appreciate the feedback.

by dahart 5y ago

antattack 5y ago

> It’s important to look at and account for the number of deaths directly attributed to COVID, isn’t it? Is there some discrepancy between the excess YoY deaths implied here and the number directly attributed to COVID? Also would be good to normalize per-capita, just to fully factor out population growth? If that's important to you than just use Cartesian graph. Polar graph shows better seasonal patterns as it does not cut abruptly at the end of the each year.

nixpulvis 5y ago

I was thinking about that while reading these plots too. But I also wonder if readers will understand the slopes.

icegreentea2 5y ago

Misattributions could be referring to two possible things: A) Uncertainty about how deaths are effectively false positives, and how many "deaths due to COVID" weren't counted. This is a combination of plain uncertainty, not having testing available for everything, all the way up to people fudging numbers (perhaps by choosing not to test categories of deaths). B) It's unclear (as in people will argue, on both sides) if "deaths with COVID" vs "deaths due to COVID (with some definition of 'due')" is the right measure. The failures is just shit talking (shit talk can be both deserved and undeserved) the government responses. The basis of the shit talking is that the red and green lines should be far closer to the previous baselines.

mcculley 5y ago
Author here. Yes, I mean both kinds of misattributions. We don't have thorough enough testing to use case numbers or what is written on a death certificate. Just using excess deaths, it is much clearer to me. As for shit talking, I have been frustrated since March of 2020 at the impotence and incompetence of our culture and government to respond and I'm tired of arguing with Trump and Biden apologists. I could probably word all of that better.

heisenzombie 5y ago

> the area under the excess deaths is misleadingly large Yes, it's always a trade-off of course, but I generally prefer to sqrt() the radial axis of this kind of plot so it is equal-area.

mcculley 5y ago
Author here. That is a good idea. I will try that.
- mcculley 5y ago
  I have regenerated the graphs to use the square root of the count as the radius to keep the area constant, as others have suggested. I appreciate the feedback.
  - heisenzombie 5y ago
    Hey, nice one — I’m glad I could give a useful suggestion… Unfortunately it doesn’t make the numbers less tragic.
bmsleight_ 5y ago
Curious how this works, trying to do the maths in my head, but polar integration not my strong subject.
- Gravityloss 5y ago
  Area of a slice is angle/2 x r^2. Whole circle (angle = 2 x pi) is pi x r^2

mcculley 5y ago

Author here: I originally started doing this for my state, Florida. I wanted to show what our normal cycle of deaths looks like. We generally have the most deaths during the dry, cold weeks of at the end of January and the beginning of February. We generally have the fewest deaths during August, when it is hottest and most humid. There was a lot of discussion around how many more deaths were caused by COVID versus normal expected causes. I wanted to make that clearer. You make a good point about the area being misleadingly large. I had not thought of that. As for population growth, I thought about that but I'm not sure where to get reliable numbers for each region. As is, one can see that in 2017-2019, the curves were showing steady growth as expected to correlate with population.

Thorrez 5y ago

>It’s important to look at and account for the number of deaths directly attributed to COVID, isn’t it? Some people don't trust that data. I've heard people tell me that when COVID started the hospitals started marking everyone who died as having COVID regardless of what the real cause was. >Shared hundreds of times on Facebook, posts claim: “Every time a hospital admits, discharges, or loses a patient to Covid-19, they are compensated 15% more according to the CARES ACT, SEC 4409”. The posts also say that New York City hospitals are “inflating all of their #coronavirus numbers” to take advantage of this section of the act. https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-more-money-for-covid-cases-idUSKBN22I2KR https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-more-money-for-...

zaarn 5y ago
I've heard that often enough from a family member, often condensed into "they didn't die of COVID, they died with COVID" (which let to the obvious shot back later that year from me being "they didn't die of the vaccine, they died with the vaccine"). There is obvious borderline cases when COVID merely accelerated another disease (heart failure), but I bet in 99% of cases, the ultimate cause of death is one or multiple organ failure due to COVID.
- hamburglar 5y ago
  The thing these graphs show (and I agree with the criticism that plotting it in polar makes the excess volume look much larger) is that you can completely ignore why anyone died and still see a very clear pattern that 2020 stands out as very different than previous years, and the plot of the delta between 2020 and those other years exactly matches the numbers that CDC attributes to COVID-19. In other words, even if you question their categorization of deaths, it’s impossible to deny that something out of the ordinary caused 600k excess deaths in the US, and that “something” happened to coincide perfectly with the COVID-19 surges.
bellyfullofbac 5y ago
The important bit is the number of excess deaths, which is higher than previous 5 years' averages. To draw a parellel, if someone started getting more tips at the restaurn they worked at, or more Tinder matches than usual, they should notice "Hey, something's changed..." and wonder what the reason behind it is..

heliodor 5y ago

What would remove the distortion would be a 3D plot on the surface of a cylinder. However, connecting the end of one year to the start of the next is not what's important. Having a undistorted line graph that plots each year would be much more informative.

mcculley 5y ago

Author here. I have regenerated the graphs to use the square root of the count as the radius to keep the area constant, as others have suggested. I appreciate the feedback.