"At Surgo Foundation, we’ve analyzed county-level mortality data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to paint a more granular picture, highlighting disparities in death reporting that were previously unavailable. Now, for the first time since the pandemic began, we’re able to study excess death counts at the county level in the United States.
And what we’ve learned is disconcerting. Our data suggest that we may be especially undercounting COVID-19 deaths in Southern parts of the US. In more than 200 of the counties we examined, excess death rates were between two times to 30 times higher than reported COVID-19 death rates."
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"Across the 366 counties we examined, there were on average 51 more deaths per 100,000 people than the average for the same period in 2014–2018. If this rate held against the entire US population of 328 million, this would amount to over 167,000 excess deaths this year to date"
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"counties with more COVID-attributed deaths also had a greater number of overall excess deaths — that is, deaths above the average number for the same period in 2014–2018.
We expect to see this: it’s not surprising that much of the excess death rate in 2020 is attributed to COVID-19. But COVID-related deaths don’t account for all the excess mortality. On average, excess death rates are 30% higher than reported COVID-19 death rates.
In some counties, this number is far higher. In Lee County, Mississippi, for example, the COVID-19 death rate is 31 per 100,000 people, but the excess death rate is 398 per 100,000 — about 13 times higher."
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"Testing has ramped up in areas hardest hit by coronavirus, so the COVID-19 death rate may be higher in these states simply because their outbreaks are worse and there are, in fact, more deaths per head among the population.
But another possible explanation is that states with lower testing rates are not catching, and therefore not counting, COVID-related deaths, which could make their reported death rates lower than in high-testing states — and lower than they are in reality.
The takeaway: In the absence of adequate testing, county-level excess death rates reveal a more accurate picture of the toll of COVID-19"
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I think this is relevant in light of the reports that trump and his sycophants are planning on pushing the narrative that Covid deaths have been exaggerated. As with most things with trump, what he says is opposite of what the reality is. Most people with expertise in epidemiology and public health agree we are under-reporting, by significant levels, the actual Covid mortality totals. Excess death numbers certainly support those views
I think this also goes a long way toward explaining why trump is so busy trying to dismiss the importance of testing and standing in the way of the Fed helping with testing capacity. If the actual Covid death toll was 150,000-200,000 right now, his numerous failures of leadership during this crisis would be even more magnified.
