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Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

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Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#111

Post by grumpyautist »

whimsicalism wrote: post #96
kyrra wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that there are financial implications for a state saying they have covid deaths. From some of US covid relief packages, the more covid deaths a state had, the more money they get. As well, you get the over-the-top cases where someone that dies of a gunshot is included in the covid death count[0]. Some states have tried to do better by breaking it down a little finer. Like Colorado provides[1] a breakdo…

> As well, you get the over-the-top cases where someone that dies of a gunshot is included in the covid death count[0]. ? It's incredibly clear by looking at Colorado's numbers, there was no misclassification at all. Definitely mistakes have been made, but this isn't even an example of one. Your comment is bizarre. The same case you're criticizing is from the state you go on to praise in the next sentence. These, une…

Prior to April 2020 the diagnostic criteria for a covid death required 0 testing whatsoever. Combine that with financial incentives to record something as covid, and the lack of other income for hospitals as patients wouldn't come for minor things and elective operations were cancelled and you have a perfect storm for bad data

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#114

Post by Sebb767 »

timr wrote: post #20

This isn't a "study", it's a statistical model. It reflects the assumptions put into it. To wit: > Our analysis follows four key steps. First, for all locations where weekly or monthly all-cause mortality has been reported since the start of the pandemic, we estimate how much mortality increased compared to the expected death rate....Second, based on a range of studies and consideration of other evidence, we estimate…

> for now we assume that total COVID-19 deaths equal excess mortality.

This part is especially doubtful for me, as there are factors moving it in either direction. For one, the pandemic measures also helped a lot for things like the flu, which had less cases and therefore caused less deaths. On the other hand, problems caused by lack of exercise and social interaction have definitely increased. Lastly, I'm quite sure we have a lot of missclassified deaths in either direction.

These are all quite different and I see no reason to assume these factors even out.

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#115

Post by amcoastal »

hervature wrote: post #97
whimsicalism wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For the former, if someone is actually willing to listen to evidence, you can cite them numbers of average years of life lost per covid death (~15).

I believe the counterargument is to that what is worse, 1/15 of the population losing 15 years or the entire population losing 1 year keeping in mind that 1 year in your prime is probably worth more than 1 year in your old age. These numbers are not COVID specific, just going off your ~15. For COVID numbers, even with 1M deaths, that would be 1/330 (US population) losing on average ~15 years vs. everyone losing almos…

While I agree with the methodology in general, assuming all of us have "lost" a year in a way that is equivalent to being dead is ridiculous.

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#116

Post by treeman79 »

tomp wrote: post #54
AnotherGoodName wrote: post #2

In absolute number terms it's more deaths in total in the USA than the Spanish Flu (675k deaths total since it began), HIV (700k deaths total since it began) or any other pandemic. Population has increased so the US did lose a smaller percentage of population but on the other hand Spanish Flu didn't have a vaccine to stop it one year in. Hopefully enough of the population takes the vaccine now to stop this. Note this…

> Something to consider if you see anyone trying to downplay this. It's invalid reasoning to use this study to "upplay" the pandemic. It includes deaths due to depressions and delayed medical interventions, which you could argue isn't the result of COVID directly, but the result of lockdowns. So when people use this study to claim "see, this many lives were lost, we were right to institute lockdowns" - that's circula…

Number saved due to lockdown

Number died due to lock down

Personally I lost access to badly needed medical care due to lockdown. Was quite scary.

Eventually got Covid. Sucked but nothing compared to what else I’ve been through. So initially was dismissive.

However definitely some lasting changes to my clotting levels.

I have to be perfect with blood thinners these days, we’re before covid I could fudge with them.

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#117

Post by sofixa »

ArkanExplorer wrote: post #70
chmod600 wrote: post #13

It looks like Florida is two shades "better" than California in the diagram, which would put the total Florida death rate as better than California. That would be interesting because Florida did almost no lockdown. How could that be?

When ranked by COVID deaths per capita, Sweden is #27: https://www.statista.com/statistics/1104709/coronavirus-deat... We should be concluding that lockdown and masks leads to more deaths, not less (or at the very least that they are an unjustifiably expensive public health intervention), and begin rolling back all restrictions immediately.

You can't compare countries like that. People live very differently in Sweden and India; the healthcare system is different, and so is climate, population density and distribution, customs ( e.g. in France people used to kiss on the cheek when meeting, including for the first time), etc.

It would make more sense to compare similar countries, and Sweden is drastically worse than any its neighbours. Not only that, they changed course and added tougher restrictions than originally, so they themselves realised it doesn't work to fo nothing.

Why do people still ignore that?

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#118

Post by nickff »

newacct583 wrote: post #100
timr wrote: post #20

This isn't a "study", it's a statistical model. It reflects the assumptions put into it. To wit: > Our analysis follows four key steps. First, for all locations where weekly or monthly all-cause mortality has been reported since the start of the pandemic, we estimate how much mortality increased compared to the expected death rate....Second, based on a range of studies and consideration of other evidence, we estimate…

Surely you'd agree that "2020 excess deaths are going to be predominantly covid" is a very reasonable hypothesis though, right? And you agree that "2020 has an extraordinarily high excess death rate", because that part is easily measured data, right? Basically: your response seems a bit nitpicky to me, which tells me that perhaps you're starting from a perspective where you're assuming the article is wrong and lookin…

I think the critique is more that the 'study' is really just a complicated statistical restatement of the assumption, so it doesn't prove or even highlight anything new or interesting.

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#119

Post by standardUser »

How many more people have died during the pandemic than we would expect to have died based on past trends? The NYT had a tracker (which they stopped updating) that showed the number of excess deaths was not much higher than than confirmed COVID-19 deaths. https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2021/01/14/us/covid-19-d...

Re: Estimation of total mortality due to COVID-19

#120

Post by mywittyname »

benmller313 wrote: post #73
mywittyname wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm pretty sure there have been non-detectable covid variants in the wild in the US for months now. I went through this with my mother, she was admitted to the hospital for a surgery and contracted some kind of "flu." She tested negative several times for covid. She stayed with me to convalesce and I came down with a "flu" in the middle of summer that had most of the symptoms of covid, except the loss of taste/smell.…

Is the more likely scenario that you just had the seasonal Flu, or that there is a non detectable covid variant?

Summer isn't flu season.

Multiple medical professions felt it was covid and recommended testing.

Some of our symptoms weren't associated with flu, but were with covid.

There are some 20 tracked covid variants spreading in the USA right now.

Tracking of variants didn't begin until Dec. But even in the few months since they began tracking variant proportions, the dominant strains have shifted quite dramatically.

T his is not some wacky conspiracy. Given this evidence, my money is on it was a variant of covid not tested for. You might see things differently, and that's fine.

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