Excess Coronavirus and Lockdown Deaths

Here is a great chart, from the Ethical Skeptic on Twitter, dealing with the topic of excess deaths.  Usually comparing 2020 YTD against the prior four or five years, analysts have identified a greater number of deaths so far in 2020 than would be “expected”, which is based on the numbers and pattern of those prior year deaths.  You can look at the difference in actual and expected deaths by cause of death, by age, by place of death, and that helps you get a picture of what might be going on.  The media has used these studies to suggest there are more coronavirus deaths than reported.  That is garbage; at this point it is absolutely clear that coronavirus deaths have been counted in an unprecedented manner.  If we tested for influenza and counted deaths with influenza the same way we do coronavirus, we would have many more than the normally reported influenza deaths.  If anything, coronavirus attributed deaths are greatly exaggerated.

The excess deaths are in part caused by coronavirus and in part due to the lockdowns.  This is especially apparent when you look at excess deaths by age and by primary cause.  People are missing cancer treatments and dying.  People are ignoring heart attack systems, not seeking care and dying.  Diabetics have low or high blood sugar symptoms and don’t seek help.  And longer term, vaccinations are being missed, cancer diagnoses are being missed, hypertension and diabetes aren’t being diagnosed.  So we are going to be seeing the consequences of the reign of terror for years, including excess deaths.  Here is something to watch for and why tracking by cause of death is very important.  Coronavirus pulled forward a lot of deaths of older people, many of whom would have died from influenza, dementias or other causes. That pull forward either has stopped or is going to stop in the near future.  So the death numbers are actually going to dip below expected for a few months.  But the lockdown deaths will continue.  So we have to get clear continuing reporting on deaths cause by cause.  When we do that it will be apparent that some causes are down later in the year and others are up.  The politicians and their willing stooges in the press don’t want to spend any time on the topic of lockdown deaths, but researchers have begun to study the problem and reports are coming out.