Confused. Projected uk death rate due to Coronavirus.

A lot of the articles about the German model are in Italian have heard about them from Italian friends.

Germany have taken the "spanish flu" route and deflated their official numbers. Italy was villified but Italy went the other way with their counting.

Britain hasnt inflated or deflated their numbers so lies somewhere in the middle and is recording both Covid and comorbidities when it comes to deaths.

Some other countries are doing the same and harsh as it is, are calculating the number of people who would likely have died in the next 18 months of any respiratory disease or infection were covid not here, and using that in their "best case scenario" projections for covid

Suzie there's an article in the New York Times (?) that tries to explain it. I've been trying to share it, without succcess.

The gist of it is that Germans have taken a more robust stance in terms of identifying and tracking, and chalking deaths up to conditions other than CV.

Their rate of death due to CV is around 0.72%.

Our official figures only include deaths in hospital.
Has anyone verified the statement about Germany yet? Their figures are going up more now.

Ah that is a matter of registration. I was replying to an individual who couldn't understand why underlying conditions that didn't interfere with her normal life, could be a problem if she got corona virus.

I'm not sure, M0nica I think we do mean slightly different things.

Some underlying conditions may not make any difference to the outcome but if Germany records a death as being due to the underlying condition and not COVID19, that would distort the figures.

Callistemon that is what I said.

Not quite accurate. Recently a 35-year old mother died at home in London after being told by medics she was not a priority. She was tested counted posthumously I assure you.

Deaths in Italy are 900 per day. But they count those who die at home and in nursing homes who are tested. In the U.K. we are only testing those who die in hospital. So maybe our figure should be higher?

Is it really true that that is what Germany does? Has anyone got a link ( with no paywall)? It’s number of deaths has gone up quite a lot

Very interesting article it made me understand the jargon of this awful virus.

52bright and Monica

52bright is correct one could live for many years with an underlying health condition and, if they contracted this virus, could survive or not, unless the underlying condition was a particular contra-indication for this particular disease.

I always remember Tony Benn saying that his doctor told him he would probably die with his condition and not from it.

Baggs interesting about how Germany counts its death rate from COVID19 and in fact quite shocking.

I believe that France used to have a different way of counting its death rate from heart attacks which made it seem very low in comparison to the UK.

There is a difference of opinion between scientists at Imperial College and at Oxford University about how the available data (which is far from complete, and won't be for months)should be interpreted.
www.otandp.com/blog/covid-19-to-contain-or-delay-and-mitigate-which-is-the-best-strategy
This article from a medical practice in Hongkong explains it well.

I think all we can do is be conscientious in our behaviour and do our bit, remembering that the more people who follow instructions, the fewer deaths there will be.

52bright, just because your current health problems do not impinge on your life does not mean that if you caught Covid-19, those conditions might not make the severity of the virus infection much worse for you than to someone of a similar age who did not have those problems.

An underlying condition is an underlying condition, whether it leaves you appearing fit and well or bed bound.

Indeed the common feature of almost all those who have died has been, young or old, that they had an underlying health issue. Yes, there are exceptions but they are few and far between.

In the UK it is estimated that an average of 600 people a year die from complications of flu. In some years it is estimated that this can rise to over 10,000 deaths (see for example this UK study from 2013 , which estimated over 13,000 deaths resulting from flu in 2008-09). Flu leads to hundreds of thousands of GP visits and tens of thousands of hospital stays a year.

So on average 600.

I looked at where the 5700 figure cane from - Prof Pike at Imperial. But he seems to say we would peak at 250 a day - well today was 260 and we must be at least 2- 3 weeks from peaking so I don’t get it. And then after peaking it had to come down the other side

52bright These are only estimates, of course, No-one can accurately predict anything. But yes, it is being said that we are following a similar pattern to Italy and Spain, but a bit behind them.

It is also being said that London is about a week ahead of the rest of the country. They will probably reach the peak in a couple of weeks time, the rest of us in about three weeks. After that they think that the numbers will start to drop.

Time will show if they are right!

MrsEggy you are not comparing like with like. Flu deaths occur in a normal life with shops, schools, theatres, leisure centres etc etc are all up and operational and we mix and mingle with people as we did before the shut down.

If coronavirus was allowed to run rip without any attempts to have shut downs or introduce any measures to control it, as we do with flu, it is estimated that 80% of the population would get the virus and 200,000 plus would die.

Vice versa if we were to have a coplete lockdown during the flu season, cases and deaths would be vanishingly small.

Oldgimmer1. Thank you for the graph. I realize that the virus appeared in the uk later than in Europe. Does this graph suggest that we are on the same trajectory as Italy and Spain?

Thank you for replying everyone.
Elegran your points are very reassuring.

Witzend it seems that there is some sleight of hand going on with the figures in some countries. I am 67. I have slightly high blood pressure, a heart murmur and mild [as in early stage] heart failure. None of these issues bother me one iota. I walk 5 miles a day, dance and have a lively social life. Normal flu viruses come and go and I might either get a mild doze or not. Yet if I succumb to this virus it seems that they could put it down to 'underlying conditions' even though if this virus hadn't occurred I would be as right as rain. Surely this is a bit of a cheat with the figures.

This one may be more helpful. It shows the trajectory.

Those statistics aren't actually particularly helpful.

It tells us how many cases there are and how many have died. It's a small percentage - about 5%?.

It doesn't tell us whether those who died having tested positive would otherwise have died (sorry to be blunt). Presumably all those recorded will be attributed to CV as a cause of death.

I’ve read that different countries are recording reasons for death differently. IIRC some are recording all deaths of anyone who had the virus, as being caused by that. Whereas others, and IIRC I read that Germany is one - if someone was very ill for another reason, cause of death is attributed to that. So the person has died with it, rather than of it.

I’m sure that is correct Baggs. It usually says that they have died after testing positive for Covid19.

To me, that does not necessarily mean that Covid19 is the actual cause of death.