[Leftcoast]

The Financial Times tracker recently added a new section comparing a country's 2020 death rate to death rates seen in previous years.  The US chart is curious.  Many other badly impacted countries show an excess death rate much higher than their Covid-19 death count.  The US is the opposite with the Covid-19 death rate (~74K) much higher than our excess 2020 deaths (~24.5K).   Compare this with the UK where their show a Covid-19 death toll of ~31.5K compared with ~43K in excess deaths which suggests a serious miscount.

That's curious to me as I have argued our Covid deaths are undercounted due to lack of testing, undiagnosed nursing home deaths and so on.  A quick read of this data suggests the opposite.  What's going on?

The US doesn't look so good compared to European peers when you compare death and case trends.  Most of Europe is slowly but steadily dropping, some significantly so.  The US has plateaued at a high rate but shows no signs of declining.

Here's the website:
https://www.ft.com/content/a26fbf7e-48f8...5839e06441

[Leftcoast]

The Financial Times tracker recently added a new section comparing a country's 2020 death rate to death rates seen in previous years.  The US chart is curious.  Many other badly impacted countries show an excess death rate much higher than their Covid-19 death count.  The US is the opposite with the Covid-19 death rate (~74K) much higher than our excess 2020 deaths (~24.5K).   Compare this with the UK where their show a Covid-19 death toll of ~31.5K compared with ~43K in excess deaths which suggests a serious miscount.

That's curious to me as I have argued our Covid deaths are undercounted due to lack of testing, undiagnosed nursing home deaths and so on.  A quick read of this data suggests the opposite.  What's going on?

The US doesn't look so good compared to European peers when you compare death and case trends.  Most of Europe is slowly but steadily dropping, some significantly so.  The US has plateaued at a high rate but shows no signs of declining.

Here's the website:
https://www.ft.com/content/a26fbf7e-48f8...5839e06441

[magnus]

The US excess deaths number was as of April 11th. On that day we had about 20k covid related deaths.   

For those expecting a bigger spread,  I wouldn't be surprised if the overall death count tally was/is still updating.

[magnus]

The US excess deaths number was as of April 11th. On that day we had about 20k covid related deaths.   

For those expecting a bigger spread,  I wouldn't be surprised if the overall death count tally was/is still updating.

[Leftcoast]

You are correct and I shouldn't have compared this week's death toll with the April data.  That mistake is mine and not in the FT dashboard. However even when compared with the earlier numbers the US is not showing the sort of excess death discrepancy in Europe.   In fact, the April 11 date is BEFORE the 3K adjustment made by New York on April 14 so that discrepancy wasn't baked into the 20K figure you noted. If we include that adjustment there is almost no discrepancy between our excess deaths and the reported Covid toll.

Granted it's a month later and much has changed since then.

I'm still not sure what to make of this data. I still expect when the story of this epidemic is written we will see the official death count adjusted upward but this early picture doesn't fit that narrative.

[Leftcoast]

You are correct and I shouldn't have compared this week's death toll with the April data.  That mistake is mine and not in the FT dashboard. However even when compared with the earlier numbers the US is not showing the sort of excess death discrepancy in Europe.   In fact, the April 11 date is BEFORE the 3K adjustment made by New York on April 14 so that discrepancy wasn't baked into the 20K figure you noted. If we include that adjustment there is almost no discrepancy between our excess deaths and the reported Covid toll.

Granted it's a month later and much has changed since then.

I'm still not sure what to make of this data. I still expect when the story of this epidemic is written we will see the official death count adjusted upward but this early picture doesn't fit that narrative.

[BostonCard]

Most of the deaths are in New York, and in other posts, I had made the argument that the difference in excess deaths and deaths attributed to COVID-19 was within the error of these methods.

Note that while we are getting excess COVID-19 deaths, we are not seeing a number of deaths due to motor vehicle collisions, other infectious diseases (turns out that social distancing also works against influenza), etc.  The flip side is that there are probably a number of deaths that may have been preventable (think untreated heart attacks) but because hospitals were overwhelmed or patients didn't want to go to the hospital, weren't.

BC

[BostonCard]

Most of the deaths are in New York, and in other posts, I had made the argument that the difference in excess deaths and deaths attributed to COVID-19 was within the error of these methods.

Note that while we are getting excess COVID-19 deaths, we are not seeing a number of deaths due to motor vehicle collisions, other infectious diseases (turns out that social distancing also works against influenza), etc.  The flip side is that there are probably a number of deaths that may have been preventable (think untreated heart attacks) but because hospitals were overwhelmed or patients didn't want to go to the hospital, weren't.

BC

[burger]

What's going on?

There are significant delays, on the order of months, in reporting of deaths for those all-cause mortality counts.  As the data trickles in, those counts will increase.  I saw a great figure somewhere showing how the numbers went up week by week, but I can't find it now.

Right now, I would ignore anything in April or May as meaningless.  March might be okay as of today.

[burger]

What's going on?

There are significant delays, on the order of months, in reporting of deaths for those all-cause mortality counts.  As the data trickles in, those counts will increase.  I saw a great figure somewhere showing how the numbers went up week by week, but I can't find it now.

Right now, I would ignore anything in April or May as meaningless.  March might be okay as of today.

[fullmetal]

It is likely that the non-COVID US mortality figures depend on behaviors that the lockdown enables -- high rate of motor transportation, frequent social consumption of alcohol, increased stress from work/commuting, etc.  Hard to tell without a more detailed breakdown.  Anyway, lockdown-induced decreases in US deaths might have compensated for COVID deaths initially, up until April.

The other issue with that graph is that a very large number of people die in America compared to every other nation represented.  Those y-axis scales are unique to each nation, and the US is just off the charts by comparison.

[fullmetal]

It is likely that the non-COVID US mortality figures depend on behaviors that the lockdown enables -- high rate of motor transportation, frequent social consumption of alcohol, increased stress from work/commuting, etc.  Hard to tell without a more detailed breakdown.  Anyway, lockdown-induced decreases in US deaths might have compensated for COVID deaths initially, up until April.

The other issue with that graph is that a very large number of people die in America compared to every other nation represented.  Those y-axis scales are unique to each nation, and the US is just off the charts by comparison.

[Mick]

COVID deaths on a daily basis, United States and the world, for the last 60 days or so:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/daily...ID_WRL+USA

[Mick]

COVID deaths on a daily basis, United States and the world, for the last 60 days or so:
https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/daily...ID_WRL+USA