Reflecting on 2020 Excess Mortality

Let’s now balance out the hyperbole of “unprecedented 2020 excess deaths” story from this week 👇🏼

😳There’s no question – we had a rough year last year.

We lost 614K people in England & Wales last year, 575K of which were from England only.

That equates to a 70K excess deaths in 2020 in England when compared to the 5 year average.

ℹ️ However, if you take the maximums for any given week over the last 5 years and compare that to 2020, you get an excess of 43K.

As mentioned widely by many sources including AdapNation, we had a very light 2019 – causing what epidemiologists call “harvesting” or the “dry tinder effect” in 2020.

👀 I’d encourage you to read more about this effect and our age standardised rates over the last 20 years by clicking through to the link in the comment below. 👇🏼

Age-standardisation is used by ONS and epidemiologists to make annual and cross-country compares – i.e. to account for population changes, growth and age-structure.

👌🏼 When you compare 2020 on an England Age Standardised graph to prior years you see the swing correction from a very soft 2019 and the trajectory fits once you see the “dry tinder” correction.

ℹ️ But even if you don’t do that, you will find that 2020 has been the the worst year since 2008-2009, and is LOWER than EVERY year prior to 2008.

🚨 NOT, as the press would lead you to believe since WW2!

IMPORTANT OBSERVATIONS:

Here’s a couple other 2020 observations to be aware of:

1️⃣ ONS have stated an artificially low average weekly mortality for this last reported week – week 53

🤔Week 53’s happen only every 5 years, so there is no average to draw. Instead they replicated the averages for last week – week 52, when in actual fact this week should be modelled mostly on Week 1, a MUCH higher average.

So, in our graphs below, we’ve taken the mid point between W52 and W1 5YR average as the average for W53 – which is what ONS should be doing.

👌🏼In doing so, we see a perfect match – i.e. no excess mortality for the last week in 2020.

2️⃣ Home-based Excess Mortality is an incredibly worrying trend that does not seem to be subsiding

😢 We’ve lost 40K more people at home than the 5YR average, 36K of which were NOT COVID.

❓When are we going to sit upright and do something about this? 57% of all excess deaths this year have occurred at home without having COVID.

That leaves 34K of the remaining 5YR average excess that could be COVID, before we remove excess in other cause of death categories too…

3️⃣ The excess deaths experience in Autumn/Winter pales in comparison to the Spring

🤪 It’s ludicrous to draw similarities between the peak and this winter resurgence.

The headlines, the PCR-fuelled stats, and the increased hospital pressure lead you to believe we are experiencing the same thing again…

❌ But we are NOT. Not even close. Excess Deaths don’t lie. PCR-testing does.

And let’s be clear, it would be entirely wrong to attribute all Excess deaths to COVID, as demonstrated above.

😬 Let’s not forget this – we’re a much sicker more stressed out country now as a result of the year long oppressive restrictions. We are also deploying experimental vaccines at scale. Both will be contributing to an excess of serious sickness expressed at home and in hospitals.

THE COVID-RESPONSE FALL OUT:

Let’s be specific. Here are some fo the direct effects from last year’s restrictions and associated-stress: 

1. One in three cancer patients says their treatment has been affected and 70% say their mental health has suffered in consequence.
2. British Heart Foundation says that excess death from heart disease has risen with a disturbing 13% rise amongst those under 60.
3. A poll in December revealed that 7 out of 10 people in the UK are now seriously worried about the mental health of themselves or someone close.
4. Problem drinking – a killer – has doubled and now affects around 9 million people.
5. Experts report that suicide amongst young people is rising. Rising domestic abuse is a very real concern.
6. Bristol University’s risk experts say that the lockdowns of 2020 will cost 560,000 lives in the UK “because of the deep and prolonged recession they will cause”. 
7. Before the lockdowns, 9,000 people had waited more than a year for operations. Now it’s close to 200,000. With an overall NHS waiting list of 8-10 million.

#FactsNotFear

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SOURCES:

All these graphs (and more) are from the AdapNation COVID+ Insights Dashboard. All data sources are referenced and linked – ONS, PHE, NHS and FHM.

Review the dashboard and the Age-Standardised “Dry Tinder” effect analysis in the comment below 👇🏼

🔸COVID+ INSIGHTS DASHBOARD

🔸AGE-STANDARDISED ENGLAND ANALYSIS “Dry Tinder Effect”

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