British death toll highest in Europe

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Covid-19: British death toll now highest in Europe
via The Irish Times
www.irishtimes.com/news/world/uk/covid-19-british-death-toll-now-highest-in-europe-1.4245336

This has made me so sad and angry. Why are we the worst? Why did we not learn from other countries and why do so many people (on here at least) think that we can get back to relative normal now?

Some of each I think, from last week's info. They may clarify bit in a moment, it may be on the lable info.

I'm interested in the German numbers. Cannot get my head round them, they don't seem logical somehow.

One of the things Germany did differently to the UK, which you didn't mention, Curious, was the early admission to hospitals of those still at a stage in their illness to benefit from less invasive oxygen treatment (à la Boris), rather than commonly waiting till people were gasping for breath before taking them in, to be put on ventilators, at which point the odds for survival are not favourable. The frail elderly would not be ventilated anyway, but by that time it would be too late for oxygen therapy to do any good, (if they were taken in at all).

Yes! I should have added that to the medical comment. It would have made more sense.

Italy's carehome deaths have been collated up to 14/4, 6773 deaths in carehomes of people who were tested and had positive for Covid results.

So, yes, they are included in the data. I don't know if deaths in carehomes after 14/4 already figure in the total deaths though- the data I found was specifically, and only, on carehome deaths up to 14/4 and they are included in the totals already published.

Canterbury thank you.

We are the "sick man of Europe", fat as pigs and on all kinds of pills eating just about the worst diet in Europe and probably veyr low levels of vit D. A perfect storm of things, a cytokine storm.... let this be our year or reckoning when we change all this for the better and everyone loses an awful lot of weight and eats better.

Blimey, Xenia, I didn't think you were the type to make that kind of remark.

We are unhealthier no doubt.

Although being healthier and living longer gives you higher numbers. That aside it would be good if this changed (very hard to change).

Lilac I presume you are being sarcastic

Had I don't know Xenia well so that was probably a stupid thing to say!

Its too early in the pandemic to say who will have the highest death toll in Europe.

We will most likely have one of the worst. I think that's clear.

As others have said we need to look at total excess deaths.

We do not know what % of Italy has been infected. Same for any country. I heard that Germany may have had as many as 10 times people infected than identified ( heard today and not sure of source). If that's Germany then what is the UK. 20 times as high? Who knows.

The virus does not appear to be going anywhere. Countries are going to have to start up again even if we won't return to normal. So it depends on how countries manage their R figure until a vaccine is found.

The fact its been allowed to run riot through UK Care homes has massively contributed to deaths. But you could also argue that care homes may be less impacted by any 2nd wave. So death figures may be lower then.

And the UK has a more ethnically diverse population than many countries.

And yep our diets can be pretty shit which is clearly affecting number of deaths.

Could this be a factor?..Covid19 was probably in the UK since December 2019. There is already a thread about this. Given that we have more than half a million overseas students, many from China, we could already have a high infection rate in the community and given these weren't counted until a brief period in March, the number of infections here could be much higher than many other countries. Presumably the higher the number of infections, the higher number of deaths? There are other factors but I was wondering whether this be one too?

"Look instead perhaps at why - bizarrely - Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam and South Korea death rates are really, really low."

Effective governance is bizarre?

"Could this be a factor?..Covid19 was probably in the UK since December 2019. There is already a thread about this. Given that we have more than half a million overseas students, many from China"

Don't you think countries like Taiwan and South Korea might have a few more Chinese nationals living/travelling there?

By the time the UK allow patients to enter a hospital they are severely ill in order to protect the NHS which now has a large amount of NHS workers doing very little outside of covid wards. They could have better outcomes if they treated people earlier rather than just sitting at home having paracetamol.

Well this explains why we can’t compare between other countries on a simple level

It's not a mystery.

Shit government response which came far too late.
Terrible healthcare system that is not even being utilised properly.
People defying the lockdown constantly (presumably also happening in other countries too)
Bizarre obsession with "privacy" so track and trace methods are hard to implement.
Poor national health overall.

It's the same in the US which is why they're also suffering badly.

So still thousands unaccounted for in Italy, France and Spain.

We added the extra 6000 carehome deaths and are now including all deaths not just that in hospital in our daily reporting

I read on another thread that figures released in Italy show that up to 31.3.20 they had 11,600 excess deaths, mostly in the North.

There was a superb article in The Guardian about the German response, which I cannot find. The German local health team (no clue what it is called) would regularly phone coronavirus sufferers and if they do not improve by day 7, someone checks on them in person. If necessary, the patient is then sent to hospital.

Sounds too much like hard work and organisation. Nowhere near as shiny as a new Nightingale hospital.

Bercows we're about 4th if you go by population. Learn about numbers. How they work. You will feel better then.

Italy has always been open about only reporting positive case deaths in hospital. It hasn't reported deaths in care homes or at home death where the person wasn't tested.

Our ONS office yesterday published the first quarter data and there are towns where the first quarter deaths in 2020 are 5p0%+ and in one case over 700%+ than the first quarter lady year. The national death toll is almost 50% higher compared to last year.

There are vorca 14k deaths just from care homes which need to be added to our data and then the at home deaths. We also need to check all the deaths from the pneumonia breakout we had in the last quarter of 201 which at the time was widely reported yet nothing done about it.

Offical estimates here put our death toll at 5 times higher than what has been reported.
In Germany if you have covid and then have a heart attack, heart attack is recorded as the cause of death and that also keeps stats down.

I personally think the uk is doing a great job and a better job than the Italians who were telling us to hug a Chinese up until late February. Ergo why the leader of the PD got corona.

SIgh! I hate this comparing.
Frances figures are up to date and include those in care homes and they count all even if just suspected covid. The uk have been i believe only counting those who were tested and testing has been very limited until recently hence the uk figures look very low for care homes. The uk gov should have counted those with covid on the death certificafee but opted for those who were tested - mmm very strange!
The care homes totals in france are huge so are definintely more believeable thank the uks.

I think all the other countries who count then are seeing around 40 percent of the total deaths from care homes. The government has constantly said 10 percent! This is already incorrect! Does the goverment think they are going to have a vastly different death in care home rate to other countries - i very much doubt it.

I don't think the population density argument works.

Ireland (which includes care home deaths, and all deaths where Covid was present in its figures) may be less dense than England, but it's not less dense than Northern Ireland and figures are nearly double in NI than the republic. The highest death rate per capita in Ireland isn't Dublin, with by far the most densely populated areas, public transport, etc etc, it's Cavan and Monaghan, counties which border Northern Ireland.

It's very difficult to unpack causality at this point, but comparing Northern Ireland to the Republic is a pretty good example of UK policy vs another approach, and on that metric it seems the UK's approach hasn't been a success.

It's worth pointing out though there are other factors that are much harder to pull out. I heard someone being interviewed saying cultural norms were a big reason why Japan did so well, mask wearing became socially expected almost overnight and there was much less ignoring of government requests. It's hard to factor things like that in but it all plays a factor, and is similar to Swedish society in some ways. So perhaps 100% composed of a lower lever distancing policy is better than 70% compliance of a lockdown.

Amalfimamma- the carehome deaths where people were tested are being included in the stats which was the question Lilac asked.
Zingaretti may well have been foolish, but he wasn't the Prime Minister shaking hands with known Covid patients and bragging about it like Boris, was he?
The excess deaths are also regionally specific. Rome for example has had fewer deaths this year than the five year average, as have many other regions. The excess death rate in Lombardia and Veneto etc are of course utterly horrific, but they are not representative of the whole country.