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?

Selma have the deaths been published up until 24th April on other countries?

And I think there may be some missing from the UK at this point?

So unless we know the full numbers of people who have died we don't know.

And yes there will be excess deaths as a result of lockdown and people not seeking medical treatment.

The numbers cannot reasonably be compared but I take no succour from that.
Care home deaths weren’t collated until 17th April. The notifications still only relate to confirmed cases in care homes. Some data was backdated but many areas were advising doctors to only put Covid on the certificate if it was known to be Covid - which without testing was impossible.
There are many deaths with potential to be Covid related that are not reported as such.
Nobody is notifying or collating the community deaths.
The numbers are actually likely to be much higher than reported.

Yes that is fine, but why then were the government comparing? I am sure it will all be clear in the end and is a tragic for all. It certainly appears that the uk is at the top though especiallly only by counting those who were tested. Thousands i think were missed before this ( as per ons figs and death certs).

Looking at the trajectory of new deaths it is unfortunately pretty much certain that the UK will be the worst affected country in Europe, Hadenoughfornow.

Look at 91-divoc.com/pages/covid-visualization/ and go for "New Deaths, 1 Wkg average"

Yes, there is definitely people missed.

What are the excess deaths in France up until 24th April compared to the official Covid deaths?

And Italy? Spain?

Here is some data for excess mortality in the last weeks for 24 different EU countries: www.euromomo.eu/graphs-and-maps/

Agree with the posters saying the Uk have not treated people early enough. Boris Johnson survives because he got early intervention.

If people believe our number of deaths are way out perhaps the other countries haven’t counted very effectively either Who is to say their numbers are not far higher than declared
We can only work from where we are Often wonder when we had but a handful of cases why didn’t we close all our boarders nobody allowed in

I have not been tracking that but it maybe here. I am sure it is the care commission who is collating figures for the gov (now) and only do care homes and possibly hospices. As i keep saying many have been missed ( not now admittedly) because of not counting death certs.

mobile.twitter.com/john_lichfield/status/1253980234669600769

Here is some data for excess mortality in the last weeks for 24 different EU countries

Press bulletin about data from Ireland on that website:

"In Ireland, as a result of very significant delays in death registrations during March and April 2020, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, weekly z-scores of excess all-cause mortality do not reflect current COVID-19 (and non-COVID-19) excess mortality in Ireland. Further data on notified COVID-19 deaths in Ireland are available on the hpsc.ie website."

www.euromomo.eu/bulletins/2020-17/

Here is a link the hpsc.ie website for the most recent data:
www.hpsc.ie/a-z/respiratory/coronavirus/novelcoronavirus/casesinireland/epidemiologyofcovid-19inireland/

Other countries recorded all deaths from a much earlier date. They had the information because they tested.

Totally agree with all the posters highlighting the lack of comparative data. So yet another thread on it is pointless.

Secondly, what does it matter if the UK ends up being the hardest hit? No deaths are good and it would be great if we had zero, but we don't. Do you think that somehow changes the mood or govt policy - cos I don't think it does either, rightly or wrongly.

We already know the numbers and there's thread after thread on here with people disagreeing on when lockdown should be lifted.

A small group of people know what the death to economic impact formula is and I don't think decision making is much more complex (although horrible) than balancing that in all honestly.

All any of us can do is manage our own risks best we can.

If the UK ends up being the hardest hit it is a demonstration that the UK government is not looking after its citizens properly. I can't see a direct connection to any lockdown related discussions.

It matters because lives are more valuable than foreign holidays, haircuts and fashion.
It matters that ineptitude cost more lives than are featuring the daily briefing.
It matters because we repeatedly changed the guidance and left key workers vulnerable; whilst my took the kings shilling and has to accept the level of risk he faces, our daughter didn’t opt into poorly resourced high risk activities and neither did many who died.
It matters because we ignored the advice to act sooner.
It matters that there are two sets of rules and the outcomes depend on who you are.
Avoidable deaths matter enormously; otherwise why a Gosport review, why a Mid Staffs report, why a Morecombe bay report?
We simply cannot accept avoidable deaths are collateral damage.

Obviously it's related to lockdown discussions as there are many on MN who would like it lifted (I am not one) - which will increase infections and death rates. There are people right now flouting lockdown regardless of what the govt does.

To reiterate I am not defending the govt or it's actions and on other threads have been highly critical. I am merely highlighting it seems likely to me a calculation has been done on economic impact vs deaths. You can disagree with that and get upset at what the govt has/hasnt done but as stated here we don't know the numbers and also won't know if more people will die of poverty in Italy in 5 years.

Looking at today's figures and comparing is totally pointless.

To be fair, Italy's is almost certainly higher than ours.

www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-italy-mortality/italys-coronavirus-death-toll-far-higher-than-reported-stats-office-idUSKBN22G1WM

I am puzzling trying to understand the data.
There are so many deaths, yet, although I live in London, i do not know anyone who has had the virus, let alone died from it.
The main hospitals seem to be managing, without using the nightingale hospitals very much. I am inclined to think that many of these deaths will be those living in care homes.
I also agree with earlier poster, who wondered whether we were treating people early enough with oxygen. Rumour is that people were told not to call an ambulance until far too late.
A New York doctor said patients declined suddenly.
This certainly inspired me to buy an oximeter (to measure oxygen in the blood).
Not sure if it as accurate as hospital ones, but at least it is a guide.

While the exact data is not clear, the trends are and it is apparent that we have been very badly hit. The mystery is why the government is not being completely hauled over the coals in the media. The rest of the world's media looks on in disbelief at what a shitshow it's been. Views from the papers in:

Australia

USA

Hong Kong

And those are just from the English language media.

At least Boris didn't suggest using Dettol, so that makes him maybe only the second-most useless leader in the world. (Although strong competition coming from Brazil too).

Looking at population density of the country doesn’t tell the whole picture. You need to look at density of areas. While U.K. overall is denser than Spain or France, their cities are far denser than even London. So when it takes hold on European cities it can spread very quickly.

This is more nuanced than we realise.

I don’t know many people and I know six people who have had it already. Three incredibly poorly, two very poorly, one not too poorly. Luckily no deaths of close friends or family... although I am worried to hear 10 have died in our local care home because I often chat with the residents on the bus and about town to see how they’re doing. I live in a rural area.

Very easy for hospitals to be managing when they're not treating patients.

And our very high death rate, which is one of the highest, if not the highest, in the world (not just Europe), matters. It matters because it's a tragedy and includes avoidable deaths.

People are being left to die at home or only admitted at late stages when survival is less likely.

Other countries are treating early. With antivirals, precautionary antibiotics, oxygen as soon as needed. It makes a difference.

We need to follow suit. We could safely ease lockdown if we got on with getting more PPE, accurate testing, and drugs and equipment to treat early.

There's no return to normality or a healthy recovering economy when half or more of the workforce are off sick. Or dead. We can't go back but we can act now to get what we need for a safer easing of lockdown.

And do people really want a Heatwave Lockdown? Because that's likely what we'll get if we ease the first one before we're ready.

It shouldn't be too hard to get what we need to safely end it. Other countries have. Some of the drugs might be in short supply so we'll have to wait for more to be produced but we can get enough oxygen, other equipment, and of course PPE in the meantime.

Dr Richard Horton, editor in chief of The Lancet medical journal, is even more damning: "The handling of the COVID-19 crisis in the UK is the most serious science policy failure in a generation."

A quote from a pp's link to worldwide media coverage above. Why has the mainstream British media, for the most part, been so uncritical of the handling of the crisis? That is not its job, surely? It's like critical opinion has been closed down. Even the daily press conferences have never had questions that weren't easily answered by the same tired old phrases. I'm guessing they were vetted.

Am currently listening to R4, More or Less, where for the first time I have heard someone confirm that the only reason Matt Hancock was able to 'meet' the 100,000 tests per day target (on 1 day) was by changing the goalposts to include tests popped in the post, rather than tests actually carried out, which was the previous benchmark. Apparently a significant number of the tests in the post didn't actually have returns labels. It doesn't take much digging...

The reason our press are so uncritical is because they've all nailed their colours to the Tory cross. Billionaires media owners hiding money in tax havens can't afford to be critical of the Tories otherwise some other government might get in and make them pay their tax. Tories and billionaire tax avioders need each other. Plus the loyalty of the Tory voter is pretty much guaranteed, I honestly don't know what the Tories would have to do before people stopped voting for them. These are the people that delivered Brexit, we can't question their competence.

My prediction is that press and politicians will turn on the scientists, (not the data scientists or behavioural scientists so beloved of Cummings) the medical scientists and they'll take the blame. Meanwhile Cummings mates, Ress-Mogg and his lot will make a fortune out of the crisis, it'll be an even better money spinner for them than Brexit.

But we can start to read the SAGE documents and see what they were discussing. That way we can have an informed discussion, instead of conjecture and party politicking..

Not saying any post here but the general tone of most discussions.