Deaths at home or in care homes not included, so government significantly under-reporting true toll
Multiple sources are claiming that the government is under-reporting the true UK toll of coronavirus victims by only including those who die in hospital after being admitted for coronavirus symptoms.
The death of 21-year-old Chloe Middleton from the disease this week has not been included in the total even though the virus is the official cause of death, because she was not in hospital after being diagnosed – but hospitals are only testing those admitted, in spite of World Health Organisation recommendations to trace the contacts of every case.
The government’s reporting decision not only obscures the number of deaths now, but means that as the crisis progresses and more and more people die outside critical care or are ‘triaged’ to not receive life-saving treatment, the reported toll will become more and more inaccurate.
In spite of this under-reporting, the daily death toll continues to climb steeply, with 260 victims in the last twenty-four hours.
The SKWAWKBOX needs your support. This blog is provided free of charge but depends on the generosity of its readers to be viable. If you can afford to, please click here to arrange a one-off or modest monthly donation via PayPal or here for a monthly donation via GoCardless. Thanks for your solidarity so this blog can keep bringing you information the Establishment would prefer you not to know about.
If you wish to reblog this post for non-commercial use, you are welcome to do so – see here for more.
I am disappointed that the government or main stream have not reported the 4 nation public health report down grading the covid 19, as of the 19th of March, sparkbox haven’t either which concern me more,
It’s a psyop for sure
Vic
What did it say?
Details here:
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2020/mar/26/lockdown-britain-quietly-downgraded-status-virus-t/
Every trick in the book will be used to manipulate the death toll so at the end of the day Johnson can claim his tactics worked. Weirdly they share that intent with the supposedly left wing site Off- Guardian which insists it’s all a media stunt and there is no real problem. Chilling to see these people sliding into an Alt Right perspective by backing Bolsonaro, Trump and Johnson. If you say people in London are getting sick and not getting to hospital and dying they say it’s a lie, not true and part of what they call “media fear porn”. I’ve been arguing with them but they don’t like it and now my posts aren’t published. Talk about media censorship! Thank goodness for some sanity here!
For fucks sake. Even for this lot this takes some beating!
What who downgraded Corvid 19 people are still dying ???
Why do you moan they been doing this with sick disabled mentally ill since 2010 not reporting true figures it’s a con by government manipulation of figures is their game lies lies and more lies untill we get a honest man in then on it goes
There is actually a strong probability that the mortality attributed to Covid-19 is actually *over*-estimated when all the holes in the data are taken into account.
One of these data holes is the way in which deaths are now recorded (Covid-19 has become ‘notifiable’), which biases numbers towards recording Covid-19 as being the ’cause’ if it is present.
Except that at lest one doctor has claimed “We aren’t allowed to say Coivd-19; we have to say pneumonia”.
plus of course, if it is present and someone is at death’s door, it almost certainly IS the cause.
1. Coronovirus Covid-19
2. Other underlying conditions.
No surprise RH that you are turning into a Virus Denier. “It’s all a get up, a con, there is no surge of sickness or death, hospitals are open to all who are ill”. It’s a nice fantasy – while you can sustain it.
Paul – your asinine distortion of what is said seems to know no bounds.
Now – try looking at some of the alternative analysis, like the one I’ve posted a link to :
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/The-evidence-on-Covid-19-is-not-as-clear-as-we-think
It may not fit a pre-conceived agenda, and it may be just another perspective, but should give pause for that rarity for you – ‘thought’.
Ever had the thought that – if some knowing conspiracy is at work – the creation of blind panic, with the complicity of postings just as those here falling into the trap, is just as likely a scenario?
I’m intrigued why you chuck in abuse so often. I have to wonder how often ‘thought’ enters your responses? The old Spectator article is the Holy Grail for Deniers. It slips into Alt Right arguments very easily. Deniers are being led down the garden path.
The Spectator, of course, being a reliable non Tory scientific journal.
Paul…RH would agree with the establishment even if they used “Shortness of breath for a diagnosed cause of death to avoid using the virus word…I wonder if Johnson and Hancock are keeping themselves amused at the NHS struggling to cope.and lapping up putting their feet up.?
Revealingly the Director of Medicine (who?) said today we would be doing well if the death total was lower than 20,000. So that’s the real target here the death total rather than the illness. Massaging the data is inevitable with failures to test before death keeping it down alongside excuses not to certify it as a Covid-19 death. If the total rises to a disturbing level then War Time tricks will emerge, the simplest being to lie, lie and then years later find there were ‘mistakes’ but after ‘thorough scrutiny’ it will be resolved in the time honoured British fashion; NOBODY IS TO BLAME.
Oh, I’m *so* sorry, Paul that I’ve offended you with ‘personal abuse’ – as opposed to your impersonal imputation of my role as a ‘virus denier’.
No – I’m a certainty questioner.
The only point I’m making is that the statistical basis is far from certain in terms of relative mortality, and that there are a variety of analyses available. The points made in the cited article only highlight the sort of doubts that anyone with a bit of a grasp of mathematics and logic would raise.
I’ve spent enough time with statistical analysis to not dismiss anything that doesn’t match preconceptions as being politically biased. You’re much more likely to find that sort of unsubstantiated bias in blogs like this than in analytical articles by those damned ‘experts’ that both the Tories and the Toytown brigade hate so much.
Now – would you like to take apart the analysis that I’ve cited with similarly referenced numbers and argument? Or will you just leave it at unreferenced blather and assertion – like Dominic Cummings?
So – the brain power of the analysts here comes up with the conclusion that the analysis that I’ve cited results from (1) the Spectator is a right-wing publication and (2) that I always agree with the ‘establishment’.
Doh!
I know about bias confirmation – but this is truly magnificent its illustration of the phenomenon – as well as the selective denial of reality. An interesting psychological phenomenonon – but nothing to do with real politics.
If this level of intelligence were a marker of the left in general, we’d be truly f.cked.
Just as an unrepresentative sample as a perspective : we can identify only one or two second-order aquaintances in our range of close contacts who look as if they’ve been infected. Certainly not enough to maintain unrestrained panic at this juncture.
I’ll happily say when this changes to a subjective basis for panic as opposed to uncertainty.
So it’s as likely to be coincidental to the death as it is to be the ’cause’ of it where CV is present at the time of death is it?
Simplistically – it seems likely in a significant number of cases. Both the number of actual cases and the deaths attributable to the virus as *the* cause are unknown, making a percentage calculation statistically questionable. Again – I point to an examination of the dubious statistical basis of any statement about mortality (as opposed to relative infectivity – a factor which looks easier to pin down with some certainty) :
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/The-evidence-on-Covid-19-is-not-as-clear-as-we-think.
The trouble with infectivity I’d that it friends on serious testing, and figures are currently grossly underestimating because we aren’t testing anything like as many as most countries.
Death is rather more definite, and I can’t see doctors faking the stats too make it look wide. Why would they?
Just read the article – it elaborates the uncertainties involved, which will have occurred to most who have contemplated the data.
One can discuss inaccuracies in attributing cause and how any such inaccuracies ought to influence decisions on policy, treatment, procurement etc.
It’d be a useful discussion to have if the Tories weren’t in government.
As things stand the only topics of interest are “how much does it cost, will the plebs fall for it and can an intern do the actual work?”
“how much does it cost, will the plebs fall for it and can an intern do the actual work?”
No mysteries there:
1. Too much – e.g. – siphoning money to Dyson for overpriced crap instead of tried, trusted and cheap ventilators.
2. They voted for the idiot, didn’t they?
3. Who needs an Intern when people will happily volunteer to ‘help our NHS’ – which won’t stop ’em selling it once this is over.
Tories lie, that waht tories do. they lie.
And the tragedy is, they’ll keep lying so lomg as they can get away with it. That’ll all we need really, a government we cannot trust further than we can kick them.
Collaborators?…They are the cause of the Rotton society that the UK non government rely on.,and its just has leathel as the plague.
Spot on jok but rh has atleast brought up complications that bring about our deaths but in my case will dementia or lukemia kill me or that famed crow disease but death will come has of them on top of that coughing filling lungs with water few dew I haven’t said so much about me but I dearly hope we reach that peak or so in around another two weeks otherwise it doesn’t bare thinking about has others die
The central point is, are there excess deaths attributed to Corona Virus, for this time of year, normal figure is 52,000,
simple answer is
No
So what?
heenan73
Every year we get the number of excess deaths of those suffering respiratory disease from pollution
By definition this years figure will be less as pollution has dropped dramatically
That’s all we are asking snowflakes to accept, what we know and the likely outcomes
Canary and Skwawkbox are both getting more and more hysterical which plays into Tory hands when it turns out to be bollocks
Plague
REALLY
FUCK OFF
Virus denial is widespread and goes hand in hand with ‘fears for the economy’. Unsurprisingly the young (under 60?) resent the lockdown and aren’t in great danger so they advocate easing restrictions. The worries about business come from the big corporations that are afraid their enormous power is going to seep away – which could be a welcome event.
Doug is simply raising an important aspect of a questioning perspective in this atmosphere of unrestrained panic driven by competing agendas.
Nobody is saying this virus isn’t highly infective, isn’t potentially dangerous – particularly to certain individuals, and can, in any case be highly unpleasant. I will never forget having the ‘flu virus of 1957 (?), and will never treat similar viral infections with nonchalance.
But the fact remains that an accurate assessment of the mortality rate of this disease is hard to come by so that it can be compared with the average run of winter viral infections, and there is a range of alternative scenarios, given this statistical uncertainty.
The number of infections and attributed deaths are undoubtedly rising exponentially. But all similar infections do that. But the uncertainty remains over the comparative virulance of the disease given the obvious holes in the data.
We can all agree about the need for comprehensive testing. We can all agree about the need for more ventilators and better protective equipment for workers. We can all agree that the NHS has been assaulted by Tory policy. We can also see that the nature of a *National* HS is a major asset despite this.
But beyond the obvious, there is much uncertainty in terms of the description of this pandemic. From the limited perspective of an opportunity sample, our contacts across four generations and a wide geography *at this point* have thrown up a couple of possible mild infections. I haven’t worked out a percentage – but it’s currently way below worst estimates, and definitely below – say – the numbers you would be expecting to suffer from a cold during autumn/winter. I’m not claiming this as definitive – simply illustrative of an alternative scenario to news-making catastrophising.
Of course – it is pretty certainly going to get worse. But this process of social distancing coupled with hygeine may well continue to spread the load.
That’s ‘What?’
It’ll pass – without anyone doing anything about it, or anyone being held to account.
They’ve been fiddling the unemployment figures since the year dot.
They’re fiddling the WCA and benefit sanctions deaths with their ‘No causal effect’ bollocks AND STILL the people you’d expect to put things right shrug their shoulders and say: ‘meh’.
Nothing changes and NOTHING WILL.
There are too many fuck-ups from this government’s response this emergency to be ‘accidental’ or ‘coincidence.’
THEY WANT YOU DEAD. WAKE THE F**K UP