A crisis with 50,000 deaths: the registered excess continues to rise since summer

Civil registries have observed 25% more deaths than normal. Also in recent weeks

Coronavirus
Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), September 13. BUDDHA MENDES GETTY IMAGES

Good morning . I return to the coronavirus, because there is no other remedy: the crisis worsens. Today I update the data on the excess deaths registered since March.

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1. More than 50,000 deaths

 

The deaths from coronavirus grow back . Official figures say so, which register more than 1,000 confirmed deaths since July, but it is also observed in civil registries. According to INE data , 53,500 more people have died since March than the average of the previous four years, which is an excess of 27% over normal.

The figure is tremendous. It means that for every four people who habitually died, from any cause, this year there have been five.
A crisis with 50,000 deaths: the registered excess continues to rise since summer
 

These data place Spain as the worst in excess of deaths among thirty western countries. According to data from the Human Mortality Database, they are followed by Italy (23% excess), England and Wales (22%), the USA (17%) and Belgium (15%). In the world there will be some country with a worse excess, but there will not be many. Peru had the largest excess in June , and Ecuador and Bolivia also had worse data, at least before the summer, according to The New York Times .

The following graph shows the evolution in Spain. Winter was being better than average, but the first wave of the coronavirus was terrible, with an excess of 48,000 deaths in just over two months. 67% more than normal. There were several weeks with twice the deaths.

We know that not all that excess is necessarily people infected by the virus, because it is possible that the stress of the health system or the fear of going to a hospital caused some deaths in the worst months of the pandemic. But it is reasonable to assume that most are. And in any case, practically all can be attributed to the crisis that the virus caused.

A crisis with 50,000 deaths: the registered excess continues to rise since summer
 

What happens in the second wave?

This is the fundamental question now. Since the summer, another rebound has been observed in the records: from June 22 to August 29, 5,900 excess deaths are counted, 8% or 9% more than normal. It is advisable to be cautious, because it is a minor deviation and may be due in part to the heat, but there are reasons to think that at least part of it is due to covid-19.

The Daily Mortality Monitoring System (MoMo), of the Carlos III Health Institute, found 1,934 deaths this summer that it judged "attributable to excess temperature." Almost all of them would have occurred in the first half of August. That suggests that the heat doesn't explain all the excess, which according to their reports is close to 4,000 deaths from July 27 to September 13. It also downplays the effect of heat that the excess observed in neighboring countries is lower.

Another cause for concern is the absence of a “harvest effect”. Some experts, as Oriol Güell reminded me, had suggested that after the first wave we would see fewer deaths than normal (because the virus could precipitate the death of severely weakened older people). If so, it has hardly been noticed.

But the most worrying sign is the trend. At the end of August, the records were still observing an excess of deaths, and that the figures of the last weeks are often delayed and cause an artificial drop - a mirage - in the registered figures. That is why it will be key to see how the data evolves in the next two weeks.

A crisis with 50,000 deaths: the registered excess continues to rise since summer
 

? 2. The coronavirus data this week?

We are publishing a summary of the situation in Spain every weekend, between Borja Andrino, Daniele Grasso and myself. In the last one, we said that hospitals were full and deaths grew . The summary is always published in this same link , so you can save it or return to this email to find it when you want to consult it.

Admissions and deaths reported every day in Spain (Ministry of Health EL PAÍS)
Admissions and deaths reported every day in Spain (Ministry of Health / EL PAÍS)
 

? 3. Quick links covid-19

Immunity. Where are we when it comes to group immunity? A fantastic review of the subject in Nature : timely, precise and clear. Brings basic math for those who want to dig deeper. It suggests that the threshold could be 50%, but adds caution.

More immunity. A very careful Icelandic study confirms that immunity lasts (at least 4) months .

Evidence about children. They get sick less, but we still don't know how easily they transmit the virus .

Subways and trains. Public transport is great, but is it a source of contagion? There are reassuring signs: like the experience in Japan and few outbreaks being detected in wagons. But there are also studies that do associate transport and infections ( I , II ).

? 4. Order of magnitude

Trumpism. Vox voters are very Trump-like: 45% have confidence in him to do the right thing with world affairs, while only 7% of voters from other parties say the same. Pew

Independence. Support for the independence of Catalonia drops to 42%, the lowest support in years. CEO

Biden maintains his advantage. No news . Biden maintains 3 out of 4 chances of winning based on the FiveThirtyEight model and based on the super tipsters .

Fires. Six of the 20 worst fires in modern California history occurred this year: "If climate change seemed like an abstract notion a decade ago, today it is too real for Californians escaping the fires." NYT

The empty Ramón de Carranza stadium, Cádiz.
The empty Ramón de Carranza stadium, Cádiz. AFP7 (EP) AFP7 VIA EUROPA PRESS
 

⚽️ 5. A 'random' stadium

Soccer teams that play at home win 44.3% of League matches ... but after the COVID, without an audience in the stands, they won a little less: 42.2%. They have collected the data at CIES . The well thought out explanation is that it is the public, that does not push the players; the bad idea is that it is the public, who does not push the referee.

It's probably the latter. There are other signs that point to the referees, such as the fact that in these months they have taken fewer cards from the visiting players and have been awarded more penalties in favor . It is also a subject studied for years and the evidence says that the referees are human and feel pressure from the public. In Freakonomics they dedicated podcast to the subject . Juan Luis Jiménez and Javi Salas gave me other studies ( I , II ): the advantage of playing at home is greater in more corrupt countries, what a coincidence, and the referees whistle before the end when the home team is winning.

 

https://elpais.com/politica/2020/09/16/actualidad/1600270628_981892.html