How “excessive death” shows the actual effects of COVID and a better way to combat a pandemic

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Even now, more than a year after the pandemic broke out, it’s still modest on social media. Why make a fuss when COVID-19 isn’t worse than seasonal flu?

Such ideas can lead to conspiracy theories about blockades and their severe side effects, and sometimes pharmaceutical companies and rich philanthropists and vaccines.

However, relatively low-profile indicators betray the story that the threat of the coronavirus is greatly exaggerated. Statistics show that Canada and most other countries have seen a significant proportion of “excessive deaths” during a pandemic. This has killed far more people than averaged over the last few years.

And global excess mortality data reveals some interesting trends and patterns that may indicate the best way to tackle the next pandemic.

Countries such as Australia, Taiwan and South Korea, which are highly valued for containing coronavirus, have not seen excessive mortality, have lower mortality rates than in “normal” years, and further emphasize the success of public health tactics. doing.

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“There is a lot to learn from countries that do not have the same mortality., ” Dr. Thomas Beanie, a family doctor and researcher at Imperial College London, said. “We need to learn from those countries and see what they have done.”

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Israeli economist Ariel Karlinsky, a researcher at the conservative Kohelet Economic Forum, has decided to create a “World Mortality Dataset” to investigate suspicions that strict public health measures are unnecessary and unproductive. I admit that I made the decision. Project excess mortality data in 77 countries is obtained from a variety of sources and updated regularly.

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But that does not confirm Karlinsky’s hypothesis.

“I thought blockade was a worse cure than illness,” he said in an interview from Jerusalem. “I was very on the side of’We must be open, we are doing more harm than good’.” I changed my mind. “

Many experts consider excess mortality to be a gold standard as an indicator of how a pandemic has affected the world. This is due to a flaw in alternative statistics.

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For example, the number of COVID cases identified in the laboratory depends on the efficiency and scope of the test. Coronavirus mortality can also be difficult to compare with different criteria in a particular country for counting someone as a COVID death. And some places probably tried to hide the victims of their pandemic.

Jason Oke, senior statistician at Nuffield Primary Health Care Sciences at Oxford University, said excessive mortality may not be the cause of death, but it is more comprehensive and comparable across nations.

“It also takes into account the possible side effects or indirect effects of a pandemic,” he said. “It really measures the effects of a pandemic.”

according to Statistics Canada Report Last month, the country suffered 13,798 more deaths than expected by mid-December 2020, taking into account the previous year and the aging population. Authorities said this was an increase of about 5%. By December of last year, there were just over 14,000 deaths from COVID-19.

By the fall of 2020, Canada had about 42 excess deaths per 100,000, according to calculations by Ode’s team in Oxford.

By comparison, there were 132 excess deaths per 100,000 in the United States in 2020, 100 in the United Kingdom and Wales, 33 in Germany, and 175 per 100,000 in Poland.

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Perhaps most interesting were the few countries that controlled various public health measures to keep the coronavirus away.

According to Karlinsky’s list, Australia had a 3% decrease in mortality in 2020 and New Zealand had a 6% decrease, while Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore were flat or less. His source data was slightly different from that used in the Oxford University study, but all over-death monitoring projects, including those run by The Economist and the Financial Times, are generally lined up. ..

According to Carlinsky, the most effective functioning in these dead countries is the strict restrictions on overseas travel, followed by targeted blockades and a relatively small number of cases passed. Followed by aggressive contact tracing.

“Probably the best and cheapest policy you can have,” he said of strict border control.

He said the extent of excess mortality without stricter measures in other countries such as Canada and Israel obscures how well those blockade tactics work.

According to Oxford data, mortality rates have declined relatively in Denmark and Norway, but Sweden, a neighboring country famous for avoiding strict blockades, has killed 1.5% more than in recent years.

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Beanie agrees that excess mortality data can help point out the most effective policies for pandemics.

But he said they are a rough measure that leaves an unlimited number of causes of excess death, or reasons for negative mortality in some countries.

He and other researchers say that some countries with large gaps between the number of COVIDs and excess mortality are likely to underestimate cases of fatal coronavirus. For example, in Russia, 72,000 COVID-19 deaths and 425,000 excessive deaths have been recorded since the beginning of the pandemic, the economist’s table shows.

But in some cases, excessive mortality may be due to other causes, such as restrictions on the health care system that discouraged people from getting help with heart disease or cancer, Beanie said. Last month’s Statistics Canada report noted that both Alberta and British Columbia reported a fatal overdose surge in 2020.

And more studies may show that the relative reduction in deaths is due to factors such as air pollution and reduced road traffic, Beanie said.

But he said there was little evidence of the popular “displacement” theory among COVID denialists, the idea that some people who were dying because of a pandemic died a little earlier.

Meanwhile, researchers warn that the big picture isn’t complete yet. In places like the United Kingdom where strong vaccines are being deployed, the spread of the virus is declining, and cases are increasing in other places such as Canada and Germany.

“It’s too early to come to a conclusion about the league table (of the country’s excess mortality),” Aude said. “In 6 months … you may see a level up.”

• Email: [email protected] | Twitter: tomblackwellNP