Posted on 05/21/2020 7:15:13 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
Italy’s coronavirus death toll in March and April could be nearly 19,000 higher than the official figure of 32,000, the national social security agency said Thursday.
The Istituto Nazionale della Previdenza Sociale (INPS), the largest social security and welfare institute in Italy, said in a new study that the official death figures were not “reliable”, according to AFP.
Its study showed that 156,42 total deaths were recorded in Italy in March and April, which is 46,909 higher than the average number of fatalities in those months recorded between 2015 and 2019.
But only 27,938 deaths linked to coronavirus were reported during that period by the Civil Protection Agency, whose toll forms the basis of national statistics, the INPS said.
That meant there were 18,971 excess deaths during this period, with the vast majority of 18,412 recorded in the coronavirus-ravaged north of the country.
“Given the fact that the number of deaths is quite stable in these times, we can - with necessary caution - attribute a large portion of these deaths during these past two months to the epidemic,” the INPS said.
It added that the increase in deaths was likely not only due to the disease, but from people suffering from other illnesses unable to get healthcare due to hospitals being overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
Sure. They’ve been under-counting. Uh huh.
when the numbers don’t add up, they complain but when the numbers seem absurbly inflated, there’s always, always, and explanation.
Or... 60% lower, depending upon how you count your dead.
We in the USA complain that we are overcounting our Covid-19 deaths. Italy is doing the opposite, they are saying that they are UNDERCOUNTING their deaths.
But then, they have this sentence in the article, which makes the whole point doubtful:
“the increase in deaths was likely not only due to the disease, but from people suffering from other illnesses unable to get healthcare due to hospitals being overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.”
So, how many really died of the virus?
And then again they might not be.
What about the excess deaths which occurred because the panic-demic threw the healthcare system into chaos.
RE: What about the excess deaths which occurred because the panic-demic threw the healthcare system into chaos.
Yes, they factored those in via this sentence in the article:
“It added that the increase in deaths was likely not only due to the disease, but from people suffering from other illnesses unable to get healthcare due to hospitals being overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.”
The way this whole thing developed starting with the Italian fashion industry areas controlled by the Chinese commies hit by a runaway CCWV (Chinese Communist Wuhan Virus) breakout occurred in Wuhan the politburo closed off Wuhan but did not warn the Italian Socialist government or the Pope with whom the Chinese government had good relations with.
But certainly violated that understanding when the socialists should have been informed and allowed to deny those Chinese workers who replaced Italians in those factories taken over by the Chinese travel to and from China particularly for their New Year while this was occurring.
Where they seem to have done almost the same here with Smithfield Pork processing after the Chinese were hit with swine flu which destroyed their pork industry by their takeover of Smithfield Pork processing. When learning of the Wuhan shutdown Trump cut off China air travel with the exception of only allowing American citizens returning..But was immediately attacked by CNN and the alphabet media outlets as a racist Republican action.
Every time an American looked at an item for where it was made in it came from China. Now China’s reliance making everything was being threatened by a change in leadership in America which was a major consumer of those products. When Americans hailed their leaders decision to make many of them in their country US. Their politburo worried.
Worse yet opponents to the Chinese regime in power had its citizens protesting its policies , as in Hong Kong, since that change in American leadership wave the American flag and present his name when doing so. All of which presented those in power the need to destroy that leader Donald Trump.
Would a runaway plague created by a nation which could threaten populations of an enemy cause them to react by demanding extreme restriction of movement by its population to prevent its spread ? Thus wind up fragmenting its economy and create defeat for that leader’s upcoming election.
In that case the lack of care was a contributing factor that killed them. Its a few steps removed from an actual Covid death.
Its statistically important as far as a health system being overwhelmed though.
RE: In that case the lack of care was a contributing factor that killed them. Its a few steps removed from an actual Covid death.
So, should we count that death as caused by Covid-19?
This “few steps removed” deaths occur in many large cities with overwhelmed hospitals ( e.g. New York City initially ).
Can we then say that because of this, we are really UNDER COUNTING the Covid-19 caused deaths?
New York City saw the same thing - much higher death rates than even explained by Coronavirus.
So if not the virus, then why are more people dying in those two places? Then weather? Gunshots? Mothers-in-Law?
RE: So if not the virus, then why are more people dying in those two places? Then weather? Gunshots? Mothers-in-Law?
The answer is in the question posted in the article’s last sentence. It reads:
“the increase in deaths was likely not only due to the disease, but from people suffering from other illnesses unable to get healthcare due to hospitals being overwhelmed by the coronavirus pandemic.”
I see one possible answer: Other sick people couldn’t get treatment because hospitals were overwhelmed. Maybe...but those people still dead due to the virus, even if not infected.
Yea, I saw that, and responded below. Thanks, I should have read through.
Also higher deaths due to suicide and depression. That wasn’t directly caused by COVID, but by the lockdown. Also, people being afraid to go to the hospital because of the relentlessly negative non-essential media coverage. And the ones who died because they couldn’t refill their medicines.
Many tens of thousands of deaths happened in these united states because of the reaction and over-reaction to the news stories repeated endlessly.
The best check of medical records is through civil mortality records, as the article states. Spain has been using these all along as the Spanish civil records system is very efficient and gives accurate numbers with little lag time (daily updates).
Daily updates are here -
https://www.isciii.es/quehacemos/servicios/vigilanciasaludpublicarenave/enfermedadestransmisibles/momo/paginas/informes-momo-2020.aspx
The Spanish civil records based 2020 year to date death count vs the “normal” observed mortality trendline was 30,807 as of yesterday, vs about 27,500 reported medically, or about a 10% undercount through medical reporting.
Its certainly possible that the Italians are doing significantly worse than Spain in counting deaths, that is, missing 30% of them vs Spain’s 10%.
I would absolutely rely on the civil records for accuracy in assessing the impact of covid.
Unfortunately US civil records reporting systems seem to be a mess and we cannot expect anything accurate from that for months.
When comparing Covid to Hong Kong flu and Asian flu, note that the estimated death toll for the earlier flu versions is made by comparing total deaths to the normal number of deaths in a given area. That’s how the CDC gets the 100,000 number for US Hong Kong flu deaths. Also note the many Hong Kong flu deaths were of the elderly, and those with pre-existing conditions, just like for Covid. And many of the Hong Kong flu deaths occurred in nursing homes. So the complaints about how we are counting deaths are irrelevant to the question of the danger of Covid relative to prior flu strains, e.g. Spanish flu, HK flu, Asian flu.
Good post SeekandFind.
“...note that the estimated death toll for the earlier flu versions is made by comparing total deaths to the normal number of deaths in a given area.”
Wait. You mean they didn’t run a test on all of those people that died? They were just making a guess!!??? /s
BTW - there are charts out there that are doing the same thing for now. Total deaths (per week?) this year compared to the average of the last several years. VERY significant increases for this year.
And yes - I imagine some of them are due to folks getting chest pains and instead of going to the ER they stay home and die. I’m guessing at some point somebody will make an estimate on those numbers as well. I would guess it would account for maybe 5% to 10% of the extra deaths.
RE: So the complaints about how we are counting deaths are irrelevant to the question of the danger of Covid relative to prior flu strains, e.g. Spanish flu, HK flu, Asian flu.
TRUE, but it is still relevant to :
1) WHICH demographic is most vulnerable
2) HOW lethal it is compared to the flu. We already KNOW that it is more infectious and lethal than the flu, but by how much?
The answers to these questions are relevant because it affects how we RESPOND to it. If a second wave ( God forbid ) were to occur, should we lock down the economy again for 3 months? Or should we adopt to it KNOWING the dangers that it poses?
To answer this we need to consider these ( I already posted this but it is still relevant here ):
There may be four types of recorded coronavirus deaths:
(1) deaths only caused by COVID-19 (roughly 3 percent),
(2) deaths in which COVID-19 ended the life of someone already struggling with health conditions,
(3) deaths from other causes but after a patient had tested positive for the virus, and
(4) deaths falsely marked “COVID-19” when there was not even a test.
Deaths of type 1 and 2 are rightly considered coronavirus deaths, while deaths of type 3 are much harder to distinguish from type 2, and deaths of type 4 are completely inflating the numbers.
The question to ask is this — in our statistics, HOW MANY PERCENT ARE TYPE 3 and 4?
If a huge number of deaths are really Type 4 ( and we have evidence that there *ARE* such types, just see the latest revised DOWNWARDS numbers from Colorado, and even Dr. Birx’s doubts about the CDC numbers ), we have an inkling of the lethality of the disease and how to respond to a possible second wave.
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