Total deaths last year were 500,000 above normal, but supposedly COVID-19 doesn't kill anyone.
Deaths in 2021 are back to normal levels, despite the fact that 600,000 people are dead from vaccines?
Seems like you guys have things backwards.
Deaths for 2021 are not "back to normal", at least according to articles I was reading in an Insurance industry journal. The actuaries say the overall death rates are 120% of expected values since 2020 and are holding or slightly rising in 2021.
Death rates have been higher in years past; there can be quite a bit of fluctuation in a five year time-frame. But the overall trend was down, and the last two years has seen quite an uptick.
The rate of seniors collecting Social Security benefits has plunged to the lowest level in a decade, which Bloomberg suggests may be due to the disproportionate number of COVID-19 deaths among the elderly.
According to the Social Security Administration, the number of people who took (started taking) retirement benefits rose by just 900,000 to 46.4 million in March, the smallest year-over-year gain since April 2009.
I don't know how many people COVID-19 kills with any certainty. I am pretty sure that the effects of the lock downs have killed more than the virus. But the data sources are incomplete, of questionable accuracy, and all distorted by political agendas (including the agendas to which I subscribe), so in the end it boils down to "place your bets and lay your money down".
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