January seems like the worst month across countries and years.
Given that we didn't have Covid this January, Jan 2021 would be horrifying
Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
71–80 of 121 posts
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#72Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
I know at least one person who’s having problems exacerbated by lack of mobility. Atrophy in old people can be a big problem. I would not go so far as to support anyone claiming this is why we should be breaking quarantine, but can’t quite support racking them all up as COVID deaths either. Reality is somewhere between the two (but close to “most” than “few”)
We don't rack them all up as covid deaths. We combine excess mortality with other stats. One of the reasons excess mortality has attracted so much attention is because there are a bunch of people saying that covid just isn't killing many people and we point to the pile of corpses and ask "what happened to them then?"
The main problem is that different people have different definitions what pile of corpses actually is.
For me covid is not a big deal and it should have been ignored. And I have came to this conclusion looking at the official data. For a lot of people that are very passionate about masks and lockdowns this is incomprehensible - that I could look at the data and come to different conclusion.
That is the point - for me covid isn't killing many people. It is killing tiny amount relative to the global population and it is usually people that were on the way out.
Which ones again shows how difficult is to argue with someone when your basic axioms, values and definitions mismatch.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#74This study does not account for the statistical significance of changes in population structure. This study compares 2020 to data including 2015.
The 65-and-older population in the US grew by over a third (34.2% or 13,787,044) during the past decade, and by 3.2% (1,688,924) from 2018 to 2019. The world is aging in all of the countries reported in this study.
The peeks in March are interesting.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
We don't rack them all up as covid deaths. We combine excess mortality with other stats. One of the reasons excess mortality has attracted so much attention is because there are a bunch of people saying that covid just isn't killing many people and we point to the pile of corpses and ask "what happened to them then?"
The main problem is that different people have different definitions what pile of corpses actually is. For me covid is not a big deal and it should have been ignored. And I have came to this conclusion looking at the official data. For a lot of people that are very passionate about masks and lockdowns this is incomprehensible - that I could look at the data and come to different conclusion. That is the point - for me…
> and it is usually people that were on the way out.
You haven't looked at the data closely enough if you believe this.
Covid is killing people an average of 10 years early. Most of these people needed no assistance in their day to day life before they died. This isn't the frail, very elderly, population you think it is.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#76See also for Australia:
Measuring excess mortality in Australia during the COVID-19 pandemic
Provisional deaths data for measuring changes in patterns of mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic and recovery period. Released 25/11/2020
https://www.abs.gov.au/articles/measuring-excess-mortality-a...
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#77January seems like the worst month across countries and years. Given that we didn't have Covid this January, Jan 2021 would be horrifying
The excess death charts for many countries (the topic of this HN item) do not show any substantial deviation in January 2020.
If you're thinking absolute terms rather than excess deaths you're probably looking at Northern Hemisphere countries, so January is Winter, which is associated with higher death rates, but you'll see a different pattern in the South because their Winter is six months offset from ours.
Yes this means countries like Australia and New Zealand may well have already experienced the worst of COVID-19 in June-July-August 2020 while the worst in the US or England might be next month, and yes given that they've seen very few deaths while we have thousands every day that's extremely bad news.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am confused by this. Either this person is only mobile in indoor spaces for some reason or this person lives somewhere they were doing police checkpoints if you leave your house (like Bangalore). I've spent at least 2x more hours outside, walking, riding bikes, hiking, hitting golf balls, etc. There's nothing else to do but be outside. The fact that I don't have to go into the office and no longer can or want to vi…
Changing routines is hard. Just because people can spend time moving about outside doesn't mean they will. Just like because people can eat healthy food in appropriate amounts doesn't mean we don't have an obesity problem. For example, someone could have used to walk to work, or walk to lunch. Or just spent more time walking about an office building than their home office. Or had a routine of hitting the gym after wo…
"Or had a routine of hitting the gym after work, but be unable to find the same motivation to work out at home. "
I had a routine of hitting the gym between 13.00-15.00, when it is at its emptiest. When the deadlocks came, I bought some rudimentary equipment home, but the experience sucked... Polished hardwood floors are just too slippery.
Fortunately, they opened the gyms on Thursday again and I am going back to my previous routine.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
The main problem is that different people have different definitions what pile of corpses actually is. For me covid is not a big deal and it should have been ignored. And I have came to this conclusion looking at the official data. For a lot of people that are very passionate about masks and lockdowns this is incomprehensible - that I could look at the data and come to different conclusion. That is the point - for me…
> and it is usually people that were on the way out. You haven't looked at the data closely enough if you believe this. Covid is killing people an average of 10 years early. Most of these people needed no assistance in their day to day life before they died. This isn't the frail, very elderly, population you think it is.
I have seen extremely strong amplification of risk by stuff like obesity, diabetes and the rest of the metabolic syndrome buddies.
A lot of the dead were having chronic conditions or were already old.
Re: Excess mortality from March to December of 2020
#80How can we separate out deaths of despair (suicides, overdoses, etc.) brought on by lockdowns?
In Norway, the number of suicides decreased from 206 March-May in 2018 to 140 this year [0]. The authors say it can be a random fluctuation, but it seems to be the lowest number since 2014 (2019 numbers not available yet)