What’s really going on with Covid deaths data? Covid deaths are rising sharply in the UK, but an increasing proportion of these are actually due to something else, BBC analysis suggests.
What’s really going on with Covid deaths data? Covid deaths are rising sharply in the UK, but an increasing proportion of these are actually due to something else, BBC analysis suggests.
7 comments
Hmm, is that so?
u/ishamm will be interested in this.
I’m quite confused by this.
If I have covid and it kills me, I assumed that would count as a covid death.
If I have covid but fall down my stairs at home I assumed that that would *not* be a covid death.
The article suggests that it both would be and wouldn’t be, and that rather than relying on the daily covid death figures we should wait for the correct covid death figures which are supplied once deaths have been formally registered.
I’ve just read an article from Australia I think it was saying that 7% of them are unvaccinated yet making up half of the cases in hospitals. However this was said in the article
>Some may have had accidents or other health issues requiring treatment but also happen to have Covid.
So whatever you die from, if you have a positive covid test, thats what they’re counting it as. Which means that we can’t truly tell just how effective or ineffective the vaccine is.
BBC analysis suggests…
This is when you should just stop reading the article and move to something better. This sub is filled with conjecture and speculative articles.
The government is killing bee’s, Brexit is causing erectile disfunction, the US is not located in the UK, etc.
My understanding is that this is true, the figure reported as Covid deaths is basically anyone who happens to have Covid when they die. As a result the reported figure is higher than the number of people who die from actual Covid.
However, this has been known and openly pointed out by the scientific advisors in the press briefings from the start of the pandemic. It’s not been kept secret. The advisors have explicitly said that this is not the best metric. It is better to compare the average number of deaths for a given time of year against the current number of deaths for the same time of year. Average death rates actually don’t vary that much so you get a good view of the actual Covid impact.
The issue is, this data takes significantly longer to collect and process so is not good for “up to the minute” reporting. The data as reported, although not perfect, gives a reasonable up to date view of which direction the numbers are heading in.
As I’ve already said, none of this is a secret and is already in the public domain.
That’s a terrible headline but more importantly, the article doesn’t really explain the significance. The dead within 28 days measure has been perfectly good way of monitoring the situation up to now, it overcounts a few but also misses a few. However, with omicron being so widespread, the number of people incidentally having covid while dying primarily of other causes, starts to get more significant. At the same time omicron itself is probably much less fatal, so the errors become a greater proportion and the data is less useful in for evaluating the current rapidly changinging situation
Statistically, and over the population as a whole, all you need to do is subtract the pre-Covid annual death rate from the post-Covid death rate. It gives a very good (although of course not perfect) approximation of ‘excess deaths’ which can be attributed to Covid.
Looking at Covid deaths individually is pointless for gauging the trend. There are too many variabilities and co-morbidities.