Change to rules on counting COVID deaths ‘reduced’ total deaths by thousands overnight – but figures show total is far higher
In August, the Tories changed the rules for counting COVID-19 deaths, so that only deaths within 28 days of a positive coronavirus test were counted in the COVID mortality statistics. It was a clear manoeuvre to reduce the government’s shame in the official figures.
For example, children’s author Michael Rosen spent six weeks in a coma on a ventilator because of the coronavirus and happily for all of us, he survived. But had he died, his death would not have been included as a coronavirus death under the Tories risible new rules, in spite of the direct link of his grave illness to the virus. The Tories even applied the change retrospectively, reducing the official death toll by more than 5,000 overnight.
But the latest figures showing the number of death certificates issued in which COVID-19 – the complications arising from coronavirus infection – is mentioned reveal that the Tories are hiding far more than 5,377:
In fact, the scam has hidden more than 16,000 deaths in which coronavirus complications played a major role, with almost 60,000 people killed – and in fact, because hospitals and doctors have long accused the government of pressuring them to omit COVID-19 from death certificates or otherwise fiddling the figures in as many as half of cases, the number is far higher and the real number could easily exceed 100,000. Even the Financial Times was reporting well over 60,000 COVID deaths five months ago.
Whichever alternative deaths figure you might consider most reliable, it is most certainly not the Tories’ 42-43,000.
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Somewhat bemusing that so many deniers here have been content to quote that 42,000 number – and sometimes even to dispute that it’s as high as that.
It’s been obvious since covid arrived in the UK that the Tories would need to massage the numbers downwards to hide their vast incompetence.
The notion that they’d inflate the numbers was always beyond ridiculous.
I’m afraid the opposite of what you are intimating is true. There were no post mortem examinations in the early months of coronavirus. You didn’t need a second opinion on a cause of death and 3rd party testament was accepted in determining the cause of death. For instance, a person with very little contact with the deceased could claim the deceased had a cough. This was enough to put coronavirus as the cause of death. The normal system collapsed entirely and fear reigned. They had to change the rule that a positive test in the preceding 3 months meant coronavirus was listed as the cause of death because it was getting ridiculous. However, the fact that 9 months on we are still listing anyone with a positive test in the preceding 28 days as a virus victim shows that we still haven’t got control of the situation and death figures are still wrong in some instances.
And what motivates doctors falsely to report CV19 as the cause of death?
Huge bonuses? Paid by whom – Bill Gates? So many corrupt NHS doctors and so easily bribable – however did we let that happen?
The government forced them to inflate CV numbers? Why, how, and why did doctors submit to that?
“However, the fact that 9 months on we are still listing anyone with a positive test in the preceding 28 days as a virus victim shows that we still haven’t got control of the situation and death figures are still wrong in some instances.”
Falsifying a death certificate is a crime, not to mention drives a coach and horses through the Hippocratic oath – you really believe doctors routinely accede to that?
Is it not more likely that the 28-day rule is still reducing the CV death totals as it was originally intended to do – given that we already know it immediately cut the number of CV murders the Tories could be found guilty of by 5,000 – at a stroke?
Fear Einstein, fear. Just like your desperate flapping about to disprove me is, as ever, in vain. I don’t come here and make things up. In the early days many deaths were not even seen by a doctor and even now there is only a cursory examination ie visual.
Please do some research before you come here accusing me, unless that is, your only intent is to deny what I’m saying because it doesn’t fit your stubborn grip on a false reality. In which case, get help.
“2. Who should certify the death?
In an emergency period, any doctor can complete the MCCD, when it is impractical for
the attending doctor to do so. This may, for example, be when the attending doctor is
self-isolating, unwell, or has pressure to attend patients. In these circumstances, it
may be practical to allow a medical examiner or recently retired doctor returning to
work to complete the MCCD.
There is no clear legal definition of “attended”, but it is generally accepted to mean a
doctor who has cared for the patient during the illness that led to death and so is
familiar with the patient’s medical history, investigations and treatment. For the
purposes of the emergency period, the attendance may be in person, via video/visual
consultation, but not audio (e.g. via telephone). The certifying doctor should also have
access to relevant medical records and the results of investigations. There is no
provision in the emergency period to delegate this statutory duty to any non-medical
practitioner.
Where the certifying doctor has not seen the deceased before death they should
delete the words last seen alive by me on.
If the deceased has been seen before death by a doctor but not the certifying doctor,
as well as signing the MCCD they should include the name of that doctor on the
MCCD.
In hospital, there may be several doctors in a team caring for the patient. It is ultimately
the responsibility of the consultant in charge of the patient’s care to ensure that the
death is properly certified. Any subsequent enquiries, such as for the results of postmortem or ante-mortem investigations, will be addressed to the consultant.
In general practice, more than one GP may have been involved in the patient’s care and
so be able to certify the death. In the emergency period, the same provisions to enable
any doctor to certify the death prevail in general practice.
If no doctor has attended the deceased within 28 days of death (including video/visual
consultation) or the deceased was not seen after death by a doctor, the MCCD can still
be completed. However, the registrar will be obliged to refer the death to the coroner
before it can be registered. In these circumstances, the coroner may instruct the
registrar to accept the certifying doctor’s MCCD for registration.”
“Medical practitioners are required to certify causes of death “to the best of their
knowledge and belief”. Without diagnostic proof, if appropriate and to avoid delay”
They are not allowed to enter old age alone as a cause of death and as coroners were overwhelmed and not doing post postmortems in the early days, Covid-19 was the go to option.
https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/guidance-notes-for-completing-a-medical-certificate-of-cause-of-death
“During the COVID-19 period of emergency guidance from the Department of Health and Social Care states that in community settings verification of death can be performed by ‘professionals trained to do so in line with their employers’ policies (for example medical practitioners, registered nurses or paramedics) or by others with remote clinical support. In the hospital setting there is no change to current practice, which is that death is verified by a medical practitioner or registered nurse.
Where remote verification of a death is necessary the guidance explains that the person physically attending the body of the deceased need not be a medical professional but that they should ‘usually and normally’ be independent of family members. However, if the non-medical person verifying the death is not content to verify death the guidance makes clear they ‘should not experience any pressure to verify deaths’ and should instead defer to clinically-trained professionals or NHS 111.”
lundiel, your 8:12 and 8:26 copy-pastes of regulations and guidance add nothing to your argument.
Lack of absolute certainty on cause of death is not so unusual as to require autopsy.
You haven’t come close to proving deaths are intentionally being wrongly attributed by doctors to CV to inflate the numbers, an indefensible premise by any measure.
I never said nor intimated that deaths were being “intentionally wrongly attributed”. You miserable little sneak. What is evident is that relaxed guidelines, the inability to put old age as the cause of death and the proven failure of recording any death with a previous positive test as death from Covid-19 was bound to misrepresent death stats to some degree. People could have died from anything and be recorded as dieing from Covid-19.
Your increasingly mad reality-denying constant posts nowadays are shifing you from the mere ‘obsessive troll’ category , to the ‘urgently needs mental health counselling’, rubber room alert, category, lundiel. Give it a rest , sad nutter. Nobody but a few fellow gullible conspiraloons (who also probably think the Israelis or US government blew up the twin towers, and the moon landings were a studio-based hoax) are buying into your ludicrous covid19 denier nonsense on this site.
Go away and get some appropriate medical treatment. As the global and UK death toll from the very real covid19 pandemic (not ‘PLANdemic’ you fantasist nutters) continues to rocket, the Trumpist/ Big Business agenda supporting denier troll lobby is going to look ever-more crazy and simply disgusting to the overwhelming majority of sane people.
Love your reasoned debate Wolfie.
Talking to my GP the other day about my concerns re the virus, he said just stay in, it’s not rocket science! He said deaths were higher than the government were saying as when GPs went out to people in their own homes who were obviously dying from the virus,just by the symptoms,(loss of taste,smell)they had to put Pneumonia on the death certificate as they hadn’t been tested for Covid. It would stand to reason that the government would rather hide deaths figures than escalate them,they look bad enough as it is without tens of thousands more!
He said the death figures are probably double the figure they’re giving out!
I keep wondering why people try to deny the figures when 700+ NHS staff have died in 5 months from Covid? What’s their agenda unless they’re Tory supporter??? Or halfwits?
Cheers Skwawkbox. Uploaded latest video to my YouTube channel as usual.
I’ve been saying for months that if you go to the Weekly Covid Deaths bar chart in the ONS roundup, tap each bar for that week Covid19 death toll, add them all up and you get what the I-Sage have been saying for weeks: At least 56,000 deaths from Covid19.
Deaths with Covid19 on death certificate makes more sense since people can die from other causes even though they tested positive for Covid19 up to 28 days previously.
Hence the death certificate count is more accurate.
But the 28 days figure is substantially lower.
We should be told.
I wondered why any Government could have activly participated in murdering millions of their own citizens in Ireland that has left a legacy of long-term Hate amongst the Irish population and their descendants across the world.I wondered how millions of others jews slavs gypsys and many other people considered inferior could be murdered in death camps and now I know.why.People who are given the ultimate power of life and death in a position of strength will turn on their own citizens because they are allowed to…More recently here in Cambodia the Khmer rouge murdered his own citizens..because the Khmer people in loyalty too their own people were convinced that a well educated man POL pot and his misfits would restore the Khmer people to their true position of strength and might,much like the days of the Angkor Wat and the empire built round a brilliant People in the jungles of SEast Asia…The British people voted to give a mandate to a Conservative government and a unassailable position of strength and power. “The perfect Storm” has come together in a election of a knight of the establishment as leader of the Labour party.We have no Opposition partys anymore and Johnson is a tyrant and has shown that he can do whatever he wants because he is allowed.Murdering his citizans on a warped and evil ideology of Total power.Johnson and his misfits will carry on and will be backed by the parliament and will unleash the power of the establishment on the British people unless he and his misfit Cabinet are stopped by the people or the intervention of the international courts.The country is descending into a nightmare and whos going to stop the Conservative and unionist party.???
That the Tories would lie about this comes as no surprise. That the opposition is not challenging their warped logic, that sources like the BBC and the Guardian have not made more of this slight of hand, these things must be of far greater concern.The change seemed to happen almost without a murmur.
At some point a twisted mind uttered the thought that, ‘if someone who contracted Covid four weeks ago was knocked down by a bus that could still feature, and count, on the death certificate.’ So how many bus related Covid deaths have occurred? How bad are our bus drivers; we should be told! Where are these drivers when the likes of Priti Patel et al crosses the street?
More to the point, how does this method of compiling and reporting compare to other (specifically) European countries?
It is generally accepted (by doctors) that a person would not enter a hospital until 3 weeks have expired from a positive diagnosis of Covid. To then say that person would then die within a week is plainly ridiculous — many linger on ventilators for weeks following admission. The only person to have suffered severe symptoms immediately after testing positive is Donald Trump, and you can make of that what you will!
“It was a clear manoeuvre to reduce the government’s shame in the official figures.”
No, it was to undermine the credibility of all statistics and give the impression the number of deaths had barely changed, even months later.
Ironically, whether the number of deaths is 100, 10,000 or 100,000, public support for the Tories has hardly changed. One wonders just who has to die before a Tory voter will change their mind?
The Tories have a long history of fiddling unwelcome statistics to their advantage, including 29 changes to unemployment in the 1980s.