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All in Covid-19
STAFF REPORTS
On Saturday night, August 29, 2020, many noticed that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention published a data point on their page entitled “Provisional Deaths.”
The surprising statement was in the introduction to a rather innocuous-seeming chart included under the title: “Weekly Updates by Select Demographic and Geographic Characteristics.”
Under the heading “Comorbidities” came the description: “Table 3 shows the types of health conditions and contributing causes mentioned in conjunction with deaths involving coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19). For 6% of the deaths, COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned. For deaths with conditions or causes in addition to COVID-19, on average, there were 2.6 additional conditions or causes per death. The number of deaths with each condition or cause is shown for all deaths and by age groups. For data on comorbidities, click here to download.”
By TATIANA PROPHET
COVID UNCERTAINTY NO. 1: Overall U.S. deaths have risen; but non-Covid deaths appear to be sharply dropping compared with 2019 (year-to-date).
Every year, CDC death records include top causes of death -- and then any remaining causes as a bulk number.
*Preliminary data shows that total deaths YTD for 2020 went up by 153,388 from YTD 2019. But the total "selected" (top-15 plus Covid) deaths use overlapping categories, and they went up by 278,496 (see bar graph).
*We would expect the remaining deaths to stay flat or grow if Covid-19 were causing excess deaths. But instead, non-Covid deaths appear to be headed for a steep drop in 2020 compared with previous years (see lowest bar for 2020). In fact, the “selected” deaths suddenly make up 80 percent of all deaths instead of 70 percent for all previous years since 2014, and did not go up in proportion with the remaining deaths as a portion of the whole.
